(The) Book of Esther in Modern Research (JSOT Supplement)

JOURNAL FOR THE STUDY OF THE OLD TESTAMENT SUPPLEMENT SERIES

380

Editors David J.A. Clines Philip R. Davies

Executive Editor Andrew Mein

Editorial Board Richard J. Coggins, Alan Cooper, J. Cheryl Exum, John Goldingay, Robert P. Gordon, Norman K. Gottwald, John Jarick, Andrew D.H. Mayes, Carol Meyers, Patrick D. Miller

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The Book of Esther in Modern Research

edited by Sidnie White Crawford & Leonard J. Greenspoon

T8.T CLARK INTERNATIONAL A Continuum imprint LONDON

•

NEW

YORK

Copyright © 2003 T&T Clark International A Continuum imprint Published by T&T Clark International The Tower Building, 11 York Road, London SE1 7NX 15 East 26th Street, Suite 1703, New York, NY 10010 www.tandtclark.com All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Typeset and edited for Continuum by Forthcoming Publications Ltd www. forthcomingpublications. com Printed on acid-free paper in Great Britain by MPG Books Ltd, Bodmin, Cornwall

ISBN 0-8264-6663-X

CONTENTS Preface Abbreviations List of Contributors

vii ix xi

SIDNIE WHITE CRAWFORD Introduction

1

CAREY A. MOORE 'It Takes a Village' to Produce a Commentary: A Case in Point

3

ADELE BERLIN The Book of Esther: Writing a Commentary for a Jewish Audience

9

DAVID J.A. CLINES Esther and the Future of Commentary

17

KRISTIN DE TROVER Esther in Text- and Literary-Critical Paradise

31

MICHAEL V. Fox Three Esthers

50

SIDNIE WHITE CRAWFORD Esther and Judith: Contrasts in Character

61

TIMOTHY S. LANIAK Esther's Volkcentrism and the Reframing of Post-Exilic Judaism

77

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ELIZABETH GROVES Double Take: Another Look at the Second Gathering of Virgins of Esther 2.19a

91

BARRY D. WALFISH Kosher Adultery? The Mordecai-Esther-Ahasuerus Triangle in Talmudic, Medieval and Sixteenth-Century Exegesis

111

ORI Z. SOLTES Images and the Book of Esther: From Manuscript Illumination to Midrash

137

JUDITH S. NEULANDER The Ecumenical Esther: Queen and Saint in Three Western Belief Systems

176

SCOTT M. LANGSTON Reading a Text Backwards: The Book of Esther and Nineteenth Century Jewish American Interpretations

200

LEONARD J. GREENSPOON From Maidens and Chamberlains to Harems and Hot Tubs: Five Hundred Years of Esther in English

217

Cumulative Bibliography

242

Index of References Index of Authors

258 264

PREFACE

In the musical 'South Pacific' it was 'some enchanted evening' when 'you may see a stranger across a crowded room'. In connection with 'Esther2000'—the symposium on the book of Esther held on 2-3 April 2000, in Omaha and Lincoln, Nebraska—the 'crowded room' emerged not in the enchanted evening, but in the more scholarly late afternoon. Appropriately so, since the room was crowded with Septuagint scholars. Naturally enough, given this context, the woman I saw 'across [this] crowded room' was no stranger, but Sidnie White Crawford, who had only recently become my Nebraska neighbor (I live and teach in Omaha; she, in Lincoln). There was no band playing; after all, we were engaged in serious scholarship. We had, nonetheless, thoroughly enjoyed what we had just heard, a fine paper on Greek Esther. It was at that point that I, as presider, took the floor and voiced to Sidnie the idea that we (that is, she and I) should organize and host a conference on the book of Esther. This was in November 1998. Given the amount of time necessary to organize a conference, it seemed prudent for us to set the conference a year and a half later, around the time of Purim in the year 2000. Hence, the origins of the symposium and of its title. Almost all of the papers published here represent reworked versions of presentations at Esther2000. We solicited one paper, Scott Langston's, since it covered a topic not otherwise dealt with. The symposium also included two features not often associated with scholarly meetings. Elizabeth Groves performed a moving dramatic recitation of the book of Esther. For this volume, we are grateful to her for reflecting on how her background as a dramatic artist helps her—and us—read the book. We also allotted some time to the reading of the Megillah, the scroll of Esther, as it would be carried out in a synagogue. This allowed non-Jewish presenters and audience members to experience something of the holiday of Purim. Sidnie, as chair of the Department of Classics and Religious Studies at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln (UNL), and I, as holder of the

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Klutznick Chair in Jewish Civilization at Creighton University (CU), benefited enormously from the dedication and generosity of many people and organizations in planning and carrying out the symposium. We wish first to thank the professionals who are members of our respective staffs, Kim Weide, Gail Troyer and Adrian Koesters. We also thank Adam Kuehl, student worker in the Klutznick Chair office, who readily took upon himself the task of shuttling participants between Omaha and Lincoln and within Omaha. We also thank Lucas Schulte and Jeanne McClymont, Religious Studies students at UNL, who helped with the organization of the Symposium in Lincoln. A symposium like Esther2000 involves substantial outlays of funds. In this regard, we especially acknowledge the Nebraska Humanities Council (NHC): major funding for this program was provided by the NHC, an affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities. The following other organizations and foundations gave generous support for Esther2000: the Convocations Committee of the Academic Senate (of UNL), the Harris Center for Judaic Studies (of UNL), the Humanities Center (of UNL), the Research Council (of UNL), Text Studies Initiative (of UNL), Women's Studies Program (of UNL), College of Arts and Sciences (of CU), Center for the Study of Religion and Society (of CU), Lectures, Concerts and Film Series (of CU), the College of Jewish Learning of Jewish Educational and Library Services (JELS) (Omaha), Cotner College Commission on Continuing Education (Lincoln), and the Women's Institute of Theology of Lincoln. The number and variety of these sponsors provide ample evidence of the many perspectives from which we chose to view the book of Esther. We hope that readers of this volume are able to experience at least some of the excitement and enlightenment Esther2000 generated in Nebraska during the early days of April 2000. In this connection, we thank symposium participant David Clines for suggesting (the recently disbanded) Sheffield Academic Press as the vehicle for publication of this volume, Deanne Hyde Mannion, a graduate student at UNL, for editorial assistance, and Philip Davies, formerly of Sheffield Academic Press, for his indispensable help in insuring a place for this volume within the Journal for the Study of the Old Testament, Supplement Series. Leonard J. Greenspoon Omaha, Nebraska May, 2002

ABBREVIATIONS

AB BETL BHS BR CRINT EncJud HTR HUCA IDE ICC JBL JJS JQR JSOTSup LCL LSJ

NCBC NIB OTL PAAJR RevQ SBL SBLDS SBLMS VT VTSup WBC ZAW

Anchor Bible Bibliotheca ephemeridum theologicarum lovaniensium Biblia hebraica stuttgartensia Bible Review Compendia rerum iudaicarum ad Novum Testamentum Encyclopaedia Judaica Harvard Theological Review Hebrew Union College Annual G.A. Buttrick (ed.), Interpreter's Dictionary of the Bible (4 vols.; Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1962) International Critical Commentary Journal of Biblical Literature Journal of Jewish Studies Jewish Quarterly Review Journal for the Study of the Old Testament, Supplement Series Loeb Classical Library H.G. Liddell, Robert Scott and H. Stuart Jones, Greek-English Lexicon (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 9th edn, 1968) New Century Bible Commentary Leander E. Keck (ed.), The New Interpreterer 's Bible (12 vols.; Nashville: Abingdon Press 1994-) Old Testament Library Proceedings of the American Academy of Jewish Research Revue de Qumran Society of Biblical Literature SBL Dissertation Series SBL Monograph Series Vetus Testamentum Vetus Testamentum, Supplements Word Biblical Commentary Zeitschrift fur die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft

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LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS

Adele Berlin University of Maryland, USA David J.A. Clines University of Sheffield, UK Sidnie White Crawford University of Nebraska-Lincoln, USA Kristin De Troyer Claremont School of Theology and the Claremont Graduate University, USA Michael V. Fox University of Wisconsin-Madison, USA Leonard J. Greenspoon Creighton University, USA Elizabeth Groves Philadelphia, PA, USA Scott M. Langston Redford College of Theology and Church Vocations, Southwest Baptist University, USA Timothy S. Laniak Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary-Charlotte, USA Carey A. Moore Gettysburg College, USA

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Judith S. Neulander Case Western Reserve University, USA Ori Z. Soltes Georgetown University, USA Barry D. Walfish University of Toronto Library, Canada

INTRODUCTION Sidnie White Crawford

The last decade of the twentieth century was marked by an unusual number of articles, books and commentaries on the book of Esther. While the reason for this sudden upsurge in interest was slightly mysterious, it was clear that interest in the book was peaking, and the time seemed ripe, in the year 2000, for a conference devoted solely to the book of Esther. And so it was in April of 2000 that, as Carey Moore put it, 'a decree was sent, and the scholars were gathered', at the Esther2000 symposium in Omaha and Lincoln, Nebraska. The present volume bears witness to the fruit of that symposium. The articles in the volume are divided into three general categories. The first might be called 'commentaries on commentary'. Three writers of commentaries on the book of Esther, Adele Berlin, David J.A. Clines and Carey Moore, reflect on the challenges of writing a comprehensive commentary on a biblical book. Moore, who wrote the magisterial Anchor Bible commentaries on Esther and the Additions to Esther in the 1970s, recalls the trials and tribulations of producing a commentary, and ruminates on what he would do differently if faced with the same task today. Berlin, as the title of her article suggests, was writing a commentary for a specifically Jewish audience; she discusses how that audience changes the nature of the commentary from one written for a Christian or an ecumenical audience. Finally, Clines envisions the future of commentary not as a discrete book in which the commentator passes on the conclusions of his or her research in one single interpretation to a more or less passive reader. Rather, he sees the future of commentary as a 'symphony' of interpretations, in which the reader (or viewer in the case of a web-based commentary) is called upon to be an active participant in choosing between various hermeneutical stances and interpretations. The second group of articles deals with questions concerning the text(s) of Esther and its interpretation as a biblical book. Kristin De Troyer takes

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on the difficult question of the relationship between the Masoretic Text, the Septuagint and the A Text of Esther, focusing specifically on the passages 2.21-23 and Addition A. Michael Fox looks at the three editions of the book of Esther through the lens of the character of Esther and how she changes in each version. In my own contribution I take a feminist approach to Esther, contrasting her character and actions to the character of Judith, and speculating on why Esther and not Judith became canonical in the Jewish (and later Protestant) tradition. Timothy Laniak investigates the book of Esther by means of its post-exilic, diaspora context, in which hope and eventual redemption is found in the Jewish community itself, rather than in the institutions of Temple, Torah and monarchy. Elizabeth Groves, who gave a dramatic one-woman performance of the entire book of Esther at the Esther2000 symposium, argues for the retention of Est. 2.19 as an integral part of the narrative of Esther from a dramatic point of view. The third and largest group of articles discusses Esther as a post-biblical, post-canonical phenomenon. Barry Walfish, whose article complements Adele Berlin's, investigates the fascinating development in rabbinic midrash that portrays Esther and Mordecai as a married couple both before and during her marriage to Ahasuerus. Ori Soltes presents the traditions of manuscript illumination of the book of Esther in European Jewish communities, especially Italy, Germany and France. Judith Neulander explores the intriguing metamorphosis of the Jewish heroine Esther into a Christian St Esther, within which tradition she is often paired with Judith and the Virgin Mary. Neulander also describes contemporary portrayals of Esther in two very different American religious communities. Scott Langston's article describes the book of Esther's appropriation by the nineteenth-century American Jewish community, a community that struggled with problems of assimilation, integration and Jewish identity. And last, Leonard Greenspoon investigates certain problems and questions arising from 400 years of translation of Esther from Hebrew into English, contrasting translations meant for Jewish audiences, Christian audiences and 'free-standing' translations, as well as scholarly translations, formal and functional equivalence translations, and paraphrases.

'IT TAKES A VILLAGE' TO PRODUCE A COMMENTARY:

A CASE IN POINT

Carey A. Moore

Just as 'it takes a village to raise a child', so it also takes a village to produce a biblical commentary, including such 'villagers' as past and present scholars; the 'who' (including one's own gender), 'what', 'when', 'where' and 'why' of the commentator; the collaborative efforts of the editor(s); and the marketing savvy of the publisher. Just as a chain is only as strong as its weakest link, so a biblical commentary is only as strong as its weakest 'villager'. History repeats itself—sorta! For example: 'A decree went out from King Ahasuerus [Substitute: Professors Crawford and Greenspoon] to assemble at Susa, Persia [Substitute: Omaha and Lincoln, Nebraska] all the beautiful young virgins'. (Oh, well, ultimately, every parallel breaks down!) Allow me to offer two 'undebatable' quotes (actually, among biblical scholars there is no such thing as an 'undebatable' quote). First, Qoh. 12.12: Of making many books there is no end.

Last year the Library of Congress added over 130,000 books to its collection. My seminary professor, Jacob M. Myers, who also wrote four Anchor Bible volumes (Myers 1965a, 1965b, 1965c and 1974), confided to me when he was an old man that he regretted having written as many books as he had and wished that he had published more articles instead. The second 'undebatable' quote is that of Professor Humphrey Hody, an Oxford or Cambridge don writing in the 1700s, who said, in effect: He who would write a book must read a lot of other books on the same subject, most of which say essentially the same thing.

For each of my Anchor Bible commentaries (Moore 1971,1977,1985 and 1996), I examined, quite literally, hundreds of books and articles. But I

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honestly believe that for each of my commentaries, I could list about 25 or 30 books and articles on the biblical book in question that, if someone else would read them carefully, that person would know 90 per cent of what I had learned about that biblical book. That books often repeat other books is something college students just do not realize. My students, all undergraduates, frequently ask me what I personally regard as an unanswerable question, namely, 'How many books and articles must I have in the bibliography for my term paper?' Ever helpful to my students, I always quite forthrightly and clearly answer, 'It all depends'. In any case, the writer of an extensive commentary is expected by the readers to have examined, quite literally, hundreds of books and articles because there are always those 'pearls of great price' that, for one reason or another, scholars have overlooked or undervalued. For example, the apocrypha volumes of The Speaker's Commentary, published in England in 1888, are a case in point (Fuller 1888a; 1888b; Ball 1888). I would like to suggest that the writing of a commentary (or of any book, for that matter) is like becoming the parent of a child. (In the case of creating a book, the period of 'pregnancy' is usually much longer than nine months!) No sooner does one's book see the light of day than the proud literary parent experiences inordinate (but understandable) pride. I vividly remember an hour after our first child was born, standing in our bedroom at 3.30 am, looking at myself in the mirror and laughing: it was as if I had done something that nobody had ever done before—begot a child! The same, I suspect, is usually true of people who author their first book. But as with the birth of a baby, one's pride is immediately tempered by concern and anxiety: holding it in one's hands, the proud parent anxiously checks it for any flaws or errors—and soon enough finds them! And as with children, where not all the perceived 'shortcomings' of their personality or character can be attributed to one's spouse's genes but some are clearly one's own (or at least one's own parents), so it is with the author and the new book! In the case of my Esther, there were a few typos, including an egregious error where the consonants of the deity Marduk were transposed as Mdrk instead oiMrdk (Moore 1971: L) an error missed in three separate galley proofs. And, inevitably, I became aware of the omission of several good articles that I had somehow overlooked. As one's 'child' grows up (i.e. with the passage of time), one discovers certain failings in one's book, for example, no indices in my Esther volume, with the end result that even I, the author, sometimes have a terrible time locating exactly where I had written something or other! While not

MOORE 'It Takes a Village' to Produce a Commentary

5

necessarily a 'flaw', one eventually recognizes outside influences on the book's conception. In my case, the book was drafted at the Ecole Biblique in East Jerusalem, in 1967-68; that is, immediately after the Six Day War (June 1967) when Israel captured considerable land from its Jordanian enemies, including Old Jerusalem. My understanding of Queen Esther's tough-mindedness (some scholars would say 'her cruelty' or 'her vengefulness'; others would say 'her realism') in requesting a second day of slaughter of Jewish enemies in Susa and the exposure of the already-dead sons of Haman (Est. 9.13) was, rightly or wrongly, influenced by when and where I was working at the time in newly captured Jerusalem. But then, every commentary, ancient and modern, is much influenced by when and where it was written. And by whom! My commentary, written by a Protestant American male in his late thirties, appeared before the full bloom of feminist scholarship had made us sensitive to biblical chauvinism and to the importance of being 'gender neutral' in our terminology. It is now glaringly evident that in a moment of chauvinism I wrote in the Introduction: Between Mordecai and Esther the greater hero in the Hebrew is Mordecai, who supplied the brains while Esther simply followed his directions, (p. Hi)

I might also conceivably be accused of being 'politically incorrect' in the very first sentence of my commentary, for it is certainly not 'gender neutral': No other book of the Old Testament has received such mixed reviews by good, God-fearing men as the Book of Esther, (p. xvii [italics added])

However, that sentence is not altogether inaccurate; up until the second half of the twentieth century, males were the primary, if not exclusive, exegetes of the book of Esther. More serious was my mischaracterization of the 'Additions to Esther'. Not having worked on them for my commentary on the Hebrew text of Esther, I simply repeated what most scholars had said about them. Not until I did the research for my second Anchor Bible volume (Moore 1977) did I realize the error of my ways and amend them. Even worse, I did not do adequate research on the canonicity question, for I unqualifiedly accepted the once-popular but increasingly discredited view that the Council of Jamnia in 90 CE was the occasion for establishing the canonicity of Esther. Fortunately, I was able to correct my position with regard to this issue in later commentaries (Moore 1985: 86-91; 1996: 48-53).

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Do I regret all these failings in my commentary? Indeed I do! Do I regret publishing the book? No, I do not. For if one delays publishing a book until it is 'perfect', then that book will never see the light of day. But in books, as in life, two sayings come to mind: Hilary Clinton's 'it takes a village to raise a child', and the observation of that great author Anonymous: 'Success has many parents; failure, only one'. It may take only two to have a baby—although in these days of in vitro fertilization and surrogate mothers and sperm donors that is changing—but it always takes more than two to make a book! For you, the author, soon realize that your creation is not the pinnacle of scholarship or the top of the 'ladder'. Rather, your work is, at best, imperfect and partial. Yet, if you are lucky, it will be built upon by others. We scholars are not part of a ladder, but of a pyramid, standing on the shoulders of others; in turn, our efforts support others who either stand beside us or upon us and thereby see farther and clearer than we did. I sincerely wish I had seen then some of the books and articles written since the appearance of my Esther— starting at the beginning of the alphabet with scholars like Sandra Berg (1979), Athalya Brenner (1995), Leila Bronner (1994), David Clines (1984a, 1984b, 1990), Kenneth Craig (1995), Katheryn Darr (1991), L.M. Day (1995), Kristin De Troyer (1995), Charles Dorothy (1997), Michael Fox (1991a, 1991b), going to the middle of the alphabet with scholars like Karen Jobes (1996) and Jon Levenson (1976) on through to Sidnie White (now Crawford) (White 1989; Crawford 1996b, 1998)—to name but a few. I suspect that it has been the experience of most of us that the downside of writing a book is that occasion when we discover that a scholar has paraphrased, if not virtually quoted, some of what we have written without ever acknowledging their indebtedness to us. And yet such plagiarism is, I suspect, not always intentional. Like you, I try my best to acknowledge my indebtedness to others. But I am also mindful of Sir Francis Bacon's great adage: Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested. (Essays of Studies)

I also suspect all of us, on occasion, have unconsciously so 'digested' someone else's idea or phraseology that we honestly think we ourselves originated it. As I said earlier, it takes more than just two to create a book: there is the author, and there is the editor/publisher. I have been exceedingly fortunate. For all four of my Anchor Bible commentaries I had as the scholarly editor

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the inestimable David Noel Freedman, who countless times not only kept me from looking foolish, but, even more often, made me look learned. Rarely have editors committed against me what I might call 'textual harassment' ! But, in defense of editors, I realize that they know their readership, their intended audience—and they know marketing. For example, the house editor at Doubleday, over my strongest objections, required that my second book for them be titled Daniel, Esther, and Jeremiah: The Additions. (Most publishing houses, including Doubleday, claim in their contracts total control over the book's title and cover, as well as any blurbs on it.) The title is rather misleading. But I suspect that several thousand individuals have purchased the volume because they were under the erroneous impression that it was something it was not, namely, about the canonical texts of Daniel, Esther and Jeremiah. Publishing strategies are important. For example, the Austrian monk Gregor Mendel published his groundbreaking work on genetics in 1866, but the article, buried as it was in an obscure journal, went unread until it was rediscovered in the early 1900s. Poor exposure (poor marketing, if you will) was the culprit. I have also greatly profited from the editorial efforts of Hershel Shanks, publisher of Biblical Archaeology Review and Bible Review as well as of a number of books. Hershel is, to his credit, a past master at editing and marketing his journals and the books of his authors. There is a matter of luck (good or bad) with a book or a baby; at the moment of conception chromosomes divide and genes are inherited or lost. In my case, because Edward 'Ted' Campbell, who had originally been selected by Doubleday to do Ruth and Esther for the Anchor Bible series could not do both because of other scholarly commitments, I was asked to do the Esther commentary. Incidentally, that I was invited to write a commentary on the Additions to Esther is illustrative of the fact that one person's bad luck is another person's good fortune. In this case, Father Louis Hartman had originally been selected by Doubleday to write a commentary on the Additions to Esther, but his untimely death occurred before he could complete the assignment, and so I was asked to do it. As the author of Ecclesiastes so aptly observed: Again I saw that under the sun the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, nor bread to the wise, nor riches to the intelligent, nor favor to the men of skill; but time and chance happen to all of them. (Eccl. 9.11 NRSV [italics added])

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Ultimately, the 'baby' (the book) grows up and, for better or worse, takes on a life of its own. I hope that a number of you have also experienced that proud moment when you are reading someone else's book or article and you come upon a quotation that strikes you as both profoundly true and very felicitously expressed, only to find out that you yourself are being quoted! As my undergraduates say, 'Hey, that's cool!' But it also works the other way, doesn't it? As Mark Antony said at Julius Caesar's funeral: The evil that men do lives after them; the good is oft interred with their bones. (Shakespeare, Julius Caesar III.iii.79)

My greatest fear is that many decades from now all my work on Esther will have been forgotten except where, in effect, I said: Mordecai supplied the brains; Esther, the beauty!

THE BOOK OF ESTHER:

WRITING A COMMENTARY FOR A JEWISH AUDIENCE

Adele Berlin

I was invited to write a commentary on Esther for the Jewish Publication Society (Berlin 2001 a) and to prepare a Hebrew commentary for the Israeli series Miqra' le-yisra'el (Berlin 200Ib). This meant that the primary audiences for both commentaries would be Jewish, and I therefore had to consider what would be appropriate for a Jewish audience. I also had to consider the differences between the American and Israeli audiences. The American audience would be reading the Bible in English translation, and the Israeli audience would be reading it in Hebrew. The English translation is already a form of commentary and renders invisible many textual and syntactic problems. The Hebrew text is, on the one hand, largely intelligible to Israelis, but on the other hand is sufficiently distant from modern Hebrew to need an explanation (much as Shakespeare does for today's English-speaking readers). A more subtle difference is that American Jews read this diaspora story as diaspora Jews, while Israelis read it from a different social location—as Jews living in the land of Israel and in the modern State of Israel. The Israeli reader tends to see the characters in terms of his or her own modern stereotypes of a diaspora Jew: someone who prefers to hide his identity, who wants to assimilate into the majority population and who behaves in a passive manner even when faced with a threat. My evidence is anecdotal, but my impression is that American Jews, and I would assume other diaspora Jews, like the book more than Israelis do because they see themselves in it to a greater extent. But a commentary for Israeli and American Jews has more similarities than it has differences, especially if one compares it to commentaries for Christian or non-sectarian audiences, although even here the differences are not absolute, but more a matter of emphasis. A modern Jewish audience, like its Christian or secular counterpart, wants a Bible commentary informed by the latest scholarship; and so one

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of my main goals, in fact my primary goal, was to provide this scholarship—that is, to read the book in light of our current linguistic, literary and historical knowledge. But along with this I had two additional goals: to place the book of Esther in a Jewish context and to give some representation to the history of Jewish exegesis of the book. A Jewish context means, first and foremost, that the Hebrew Bible will not be read as a foreshadowing of the New Testament. In fact, it won't be read in light of the New Testament at all, except perhaps for occasional points of historical or philological interest (which do not apply to Esther). A Jewish context also means that the Masoretic Text (MT) will be given the place of honor. That is not to say that textual criticism will be ignored or that the versions of the Esther story in the Septuagint and the Alpha text will be passed over in silence. In fact, these texts, along with Josephus' retelling of the story, provide a fascinating window into the development of the story and its early interpretation. But I invoke them for comparison with the MT, not to suggest replacements for the MT. The MT is the accepted text of the Jewish community, and it is that text that needs to be interpreted. For the book of Esther this is especially important, for the two Greek versions tell quite a different story from the Masoretic version. They are not as amusing and they do not have as strong an emphasis on Purim. More to the point, they are not, in Jewish eyes, part of the Bible; they do not compete with the MT story of Esther. In the case of Esther, there is a more specific Jewish context—the holiday of Purim. This is the holiday when the book is read and for which the book provides the etiology and the blueprint for celebration. The book is important in Jewish life, for without it there would be no Purim. That is to say, apart from the book of Esther, there is no mention in the Bible of Purim and no reason for its celebration. A Jewish audience knows the book of Esther from the celebration of Purim. Even secular Jews are familiar with the story and the characters, and associate the book with fun and festivity. In my commentary I played up the connection between the book and the holiday and emphasized that the former, like the latter, is carnivalesque. The book not only sets out when and how the holiday is to be celebrated, it sets the tone for the celebration. The book is meant to be funny, and I want people to appreciate its comic nature and enjoy reading it. I venture to say that this is a lot easier for a Jewish audience than for a Christian one, for there is no Purim in the Christian calendar and there is a stream of Christian exegesis that perceives the book as lacking in moral values and in literary merit. Jews are more disposed to like the book, although there are parts of it that modern Jews also find offensive.

Berlin Writing a Commentary for a Jewish Audience

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The History of Jewish Exegesis Traditional Jewish exegesis, once ignored because it was pre-critical, little known and seemingly irrelevant to scholarly exegesis, has gained new attention in all biblical commentaries, and it seems only appropriate to call upon it for a Jewish commentary, for this, too, is part of the Jewish context in which the book has traditionally been read. The purpose goes beyond simply recapturing a piece of the history of biblical interpretation. It includes an appreciation of how Jews interpreted the book in an earlier age, how modern interpretations differ from ancient ones, and how earlier interpretations can enrich contemporary ones. If reading Esther was meant to be fun, then reading the rabbinic midrashim certainly adds to the fun. There is a large body of midrashic interpretation on the book of Esther.1 The Babylonian Talmud contains a midrashic exposition of the entire book in b. Meg. 10b-17a (the only midrashic exposition of an entire biblical book to be incorporated into the Talmud [Segal 1994]). There are two Aramaic translations of Esther, Targum Rishon and Targum Sheni (Grossfeld 1983, 1991, 1994). They are among the most expansive of the targumim, and it is stretching a point to call them translations; they are better labelled 'midrashim'. A number of midrashic collections have been preserved, including Esther Rabbah, Abba Goryon, Panim 'Aherim (two versions), Leqah Tov, Midrash Megillat 'Ester and 'Aggadat 'Ester. Pirke deRabbi Eliezer, chs. 49-50, also contains material on Esther, as does Yalqut Shimoni. In addition, Midrash Shoher Tov, a midrash on psalms, contains material on Esther in the chapter on Psalm 22. Seder 'Olam devotes ch. 29 to Esther. While these works span centuries, and, as one would expect, there are many differences among them, they share what Eliezer Segal calls an 'infrastructure of thematic and narrative assumptions' such that we can speak of a common exegetical tradition, which, according to Segal, probably took shape in the Tannaitic period or before (first or second century CE—around or slightly after the time of Josephus [Segal 1994,1: 20]). Thus, the midrashim preserve a very old perspective on the story of Esther, and one that proved enduring. Like midrash in general, the midrashim on Esther seek to weave a particular passage, character or episode into the fabric of the entire Bible and to make the meaning of the passage congruent with the values and

1 For bibliography see Walfish 1993. For an English compilation see Ginzberg 1913: 363-448.

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practices of rabbinic Judaism. As part of Scripture, and as the authoritative text for Purim, the book of Esther must be meaningful for a traditional Jewish community. The midrashim make it so by embellishing the text with fanciful episodes and dialogues that read between the lines, as it were—drawing the characters in sharper relief than the Bible does and constructing a literary and religious world around the text that is quite different from the world of the Mi's story. The midrashim are unabashedly anachronistic and delightfully fanciful. While the modern reader may look with indulgent amusement at some of the midrashic interpretations, we should understand how they make the text come alive within the framework of rabbinic Judaism. And, while it is unlikely that the rabbis viewed Esther as a comedy, many of their comments add to the fun of reading the story. Let us look at some illustrations. The many reversals in the story are often pointed out in modern commentaries, and they are surely a mark of the story's artistic design as well as its plot structure. The rabbis were not what we would call 'literary critics', yet in one instance at least they capture the sense that the plot is built on reversals. They say about Ahashuerus that: Ahashuerus who put his wife to death on account of his friend, is the same Ahashuerus who put his friend to death on account of his wife. (Est. R. 1.1; Targ. Sheni)

This tersely symmetrical statement needs unpacking. The wife who was put to death is Vashti. The MT does not say she was put to death, but her fate was often interpreted this way. She was put to death on account of the king's 'friend' or advisor, Memucan, who is the one who suggested what should be done when Vashti disobeyed the king. The rabbis identified Memucan with Haman. So the king put his wife Vashti to death on account of his friend Haman, and put his friend Haman to death on account of his wife Esther. The plot and its reversal are neatly symmetrical. Chapter 6 contains some of the best scenes in the story. First Haman designs a special ceremony of honor, thinking it will be used to honor him. Then he is ordered to carry out his plan in order to honor Mordecai. The theme of shame and honor, which Timothy Laniak has explicated so well (Laniak 1998), is certainly the central theme here. The midrash extends and enhances this theme in the illustrations I will present. The midrash accomplishes this in ways that are not permitted for modern exegetes. It constructs a non-existent dialogue and fabricates a non-existent episode featuring a non-existent character. But the result is a heightening, or

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making more explicit, of what appears to be the implicit intention of the MT.

Most readers understand that Haman wants a special honor, but they do not fully comprehend that the honor he wants is to be king. This I have shown in my commentary, on the analogy of the Greek sources, which make it clear that wearing the king's own robe, which is what Haman requests, is tantamount to asking for the kingship. Interestingly, the midrashim also suggest that Haman is aiming for the kingship. Pirke deRabbi Eliezer notices that the words 'upon whose head is the crown' which occur in Haman's initial request in 6.8, are missing in v. 9 when Haman says 'let the robe and the horse be given' (and also in v. 11 when the ceremony is to be carried out). What happened to the crown? The omission is explained in the following way: Haman said in his heart: He does not desire to exalt any other man except me. I will speak words so that I shall be king just as he is. He said to him: Let them bring the apparel which the king wore on the day of the coronation, and (let them bring) the horse upon which the king rode on the coronation day, and the crown which was put upon the head of the king on the day of coronation. The king was exceedingly angry because of the crown. The king said: It does not suffice this villain, but he must even desire the crown which is upon my head. Haman saw that the king was angry because of the crown; he said: 'And let the apparel and the horse be delivered to the hand of one of the king's most noble princes'.

In other words, Haman had gone too far, the king realized it, and Haman was forced to retract part of the honor for which he had wished. In v. 11 'Haman took the garb and the horse and arrayed Mordecai'. This is stated matter-of-factly, with no reaction from Haman or Mordecai. Again the midrash constructs a dialogue that adds to the honor of Mordecai and to the disgrace of Haman: Haman took the apparel and the horse and went to Mordecai. (Haman) said to him: Arise and put on the purple of the king. (Mordecai) said to him: Villain! Do you not know that for three days 1 have been wearing sackcloth and ashes, sitting in the ashes, because of what you have done to me? Now take me to the bath-house and afterwards I will put on the purple of the king. And he washed him and dressed him. (Haman) said to him: Mount and ride on the horse. He said to (Haman): On account of the affliction of the fast I have no strength to mount and ride on the horse. What did Haman 2. Many modern commentators understand the crown as being on the head of the horse, to mark the horse as belonging to the king, but earlier commentators (and some modern ones) take it to mean the crown worn by the king.

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The Book of Esther in Modern Research do? He bent down, and Mordecai put his foot upon his neck, and he mounted and rode on the horse.. .3

There are several variants on this story. According to Panim 'Aherim, there was no attendant in the bath-house so Haman had to scrub the bath himself. In the Talmudic tradition, b. Meg. 16a has Mordecai kicking Haman as he mounts the horse. (See Segal 1994, III: 73-83 for other variants.) In all these ways, the midrash degrades Haman and gives the clever Mordecai a more active role in bringing dishonor to his enemy. This midrash is funny in its own way and has its own type of bodily humor, which is not out of place in a carnivalesque story like Esther, but which goes far beyond the MT. After Haman honored Mordecai we are told that 'Haman hurried home mourning and with covered head' (Est. 6.12). The word 'mourning' is somewhat strange, although most modern exegetes take it to mean that Haman was depressed. The rabbis, however, who lost no opportunity to besmirch and humiliate Haman, told a wonderfully gross midrashic tale that explains the word literally and also adds to the disgrace of Haman as he was honoring Mordecai. Targum Rishon tells it this way, in its rendering of Est. 6.11, where Haman is leading Mordecai on the horse (see also b. Meg. 16a): As they were walking opposite the house of the wicked Haman, Shlakhtevath, his daughter, looked down from the roof, and it appeared that the man walking on the road was Mordekhai, while the man riding on the horse was her father. So she took a pot of excrement and flung it on his head. He raised his head and said to her: 'You, too, my daughter, you embarrass me'. Whereupon, immediately she fell from the roof and died. (Grossfeld 1991:72)

This rabbinic comment, which seems scatological in the extreme, is not as idiosyncratic as it may at first appear. Mikhail Bakhtin, in Rabelais and His World, observes that the drenching or drowning in urine in Rabelais is part of the carnivalesque nature of his work. Bakhtin then notes (1984: 148) that the tossing of excrement is known from ancient literature. A chamber pot is thrown at the head of Odysseus in Aeschylus's 'The Collector of Bones', and a similar episode is found in Sophocles' 'The Feast of the Achaeans'. Ancient Greek vases picture Heracles lying drunk at a prostitute's door while the procuress empties a chamber pot on his 3. Friedlander 1965:404. Variations on this pericope occur in Panim 'Aherim and elsewhere.

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head. Although the MT of Esther contains none of this bodily humor, the midrashic addition to the story is completely within the spirit of the ancient expression of the carnivalesque. So far I have cited examples where the meaning of the text, implicit or explicit, is congruent with the meaning that the rabbis ascribed to it. Indeed, the midrashic comments help us see the meaning more clearly, if more imaginatively. But this is not always so. The rabbis were not interested in what we call 'the original meaning of the text'. They were more intent on the meaning for their own time, and they engage in obviously anachronistic readings. They thereby lift the biblical story out of its original context and apply it to another context. In so doing, they keep the Bible alive, for the moment that the Bible cannot be read into contemporary life it becomes an antiquarian document, of little import to a living community. Scholars want to know what the text meant when it was first written; religious communities want to know what it means now. 'Now' changes, of course, in each generation, and with it come changes in interpretation. But to the extent that Jews perceive a continuity in their identity, and in their precarious place in the world, the book of Esther remains meaningful and its traditional interpretation remains edifying. I will end with an example. Haman's accusation that the laws or customs of the Jews are different (Est. 3.8) touches a nerve, for Jews have always perceived themselves as different. This is usually a very serious matter, sometimes with dire consequences. But Esther is a funny book, and a midrashic interpretation of this phrase shows that Jewish differentness can be the source of amusement to Jews. Tar gum Sheni explains the biblical phrase at great length, with a catalogue of things that made Jews in rabbinic times different from their neighbors. The list includes the refusal of Jews to intermarry, various lifecycle observances (circumcision, family purity), holiday observances, regular prayer times and a brief capsule of biblical history. All of this is told from the non-Jewish viewpoint, in statements that make clear that doing business with Jews is, to say the least, inconvenient and that the Jews are not contributing their share to society. One part of the passage says: Now whoever of them is taken to engage in the service of the king, he passes the year in idleness. The day they want to buy from us they say is a lawful day, but the day we want to buy from them they close the markets on us and say it is an unlawful day. The first hour they say 'We must recite the Shema'; the second (hour) they (say) 'We must offer prayers...' (Grossfeld 1991:145)

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The Book of Esther in Modern Research

Later in the passage we read: [On the fifteenth day of Tishri] they set up booths on the roofs of their houses, then they go out to the orchards and cut down our palm branches, pluck down our citrons, strip off our willows, and lay waste our orchards... Then they make hosannas, saying: Just as the king does in battle, so do we; they enter the synagogue and pray; they rejoice. Then they go around with hosannas, singing and dancing like goats; we do not know if they indeed curse us or bless us. They call it 'The Feast of Booths' and do not perform the service of the king; they say to us: Today it is forbidden... (Grossfeld 1991: 146)

What we have here is a picture of the Jewish view of the non-Jewish view of Jewish practices. It is hard to know how to take it. Is it a serious representation of how negatively the Jews were perceived by their neighbors? Or is it, as I think, a wonderfully self-conscious and self-deprecating, tongue-in-cheek portrayal of how strange Jewish customs must look to non-Jews (Walfish 1993: 145-46)? It is not so different today for observant Jews who request special food, want to leave work early on Fridays and ask for vacation time on a lot of seemingly random weekdays in September. All things considered, I find the Targum's self-mockery to be a form of self-assertion. This list, after all, is Jewish identity in a nutshell, and there is no hint that it is about to end. Like the book of Esther, Targum Shenfs catalogue says that Jews in the diaspora can maintain their identity, that Jewish life continues. It reasserts that Esther is a diaspora story in which the Jews will survive any threat from their enemies. And once again, the Targum's explanation of Haman's accusation adds to the fun of a Jewish reading of Esther.

ESTHER AND THE FUTURE OF THE COMMENTARY David J.A. Clines

Looking back on my Esther commentary of 1984 (Clines 1984a), I fell to wondering how differently I would write it if I were beginning now. It would certainly not be the same book. What is it that has changed in 15 years, not such a long span of time, that provokes such a thought? To tell the truth, when I began working on Esther, it was not from any love of the book, of which I knew little, but entirely to get my commentary on Ezra-Nehemiah published, since the publisher wanted to include Esther with those books. As it turned out, it was Esther that stole my heart, a much neglected book in the scholarly community in those days (unlike now), a book with hidden depths and delights, as I was soon to discover. Strangely enough, though I knew little about Esther, I had no doubt about what a commentary on it should look like: like every other commentary on a biblical book, of which there were abundant examples (even then). Like every other commentary, its aim should be to give the reader a clear and concise account of what the book was about, what its individual sections and verses meant. It aimed at being correct. Though there were doubtless many differing interpretations of many of its verses, my task as a commentator was to sort out the good interpretations from the bad, the better from the worse and tell the reader the best. However modest I might have been as a person (not very, probably), my commentatorial responsibility was the extremely immodest one of finding the right interpretation, the best one, which the reader could rely on as the latest word, the most considered opinion. But now, at the turn of the millennium, the word on the street and in the quadrangle is: .. .Farewell to the One Right Interpretation! Before I begin to jettison the traditional view of the commentator's task, let me say a word about what a demanding and responsible one it was.

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The Book of Esther in Modern Research

1. In the first place, it required a humble preparedness to read and consider the previous commentaries, in depth and in detail. Not, thankfully, all the commentaries ever written, for it was a facet of the pyramidal view of the accumulation of true knowledge that the latest was usually the best, and the further back you went among commentaries the more nonsense and outmoded stuff you would find. A clever commentator, though, would read back at least to the beginning of the century (the twentieth, I mean), and would be delighted to be able to parade from a really ancient commentator (a nineteenth-century one, for example) a telling point, a bon mot, an insight, that had perhaps dropped out of sight in the commentatorial tradition. In this way, a laudable respect for one's predecessors could be niftily combined with a self-serving demonstration of the commentator's own hard work and breadth of learning. 2. In the second place, this style of commentary writing put a premium on analysis and evaluation. Weighing up the opinions and arguments of giants among commentators, forming your own opinion—which must be not only the best argued interpretation of the particular passage, but also coherent with every other interpretational position you had adopted or were going to adopt in your snail-like progress through the book—demanded a high order of intellectual skills and yielded a quite unique kind of pleasure when you were successful. Managing to combine the best of Commentator A's views with the best of Commentator B's and the best of all the others, while discarding the dross, not only made you feel a superior kind of person; it actually made you a superior kind of person. There was always some room for innovation, but new ideas have never been the most desirable elements in a commentary. New syntheses, new coherence, new observations of the detail of the text, new judgments, new angles of vision, new comparative data—these make a commentary vibrant and vaut le voyage. But, in the history of interpretation, new interpretations, like new conjectural emendations of the text, have usually been wrong, and a prudent commentator will suppress almost every inclination towards novelty. 3. Above all, the quest for the best and most true interpretation was an instantiation of that wonderful intellectual project, the quest for truth, the very reason I myself went to university as a naive 17-year-old and the only reason for my entry into the academic profession. Compared with a quest for falsehood, or even with no quest at all, the quest for truth, or, in the commentator's case, for the right interpretation, can only be acclaimed and admired.

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And yet, in those magical days between the apocalyptic Orwellian year of 1984, with which I began, and the present moment, something has happened, something of such import as to make even an old truth-seeker like myself stop in my tracks and declare that, after all, there is no truth, only truths, no right interpretations, only interpretations that are accepted by this community or that, no commentaries, therefore, that can enshrine the holy grail of the definitive meaning. Call it the slide to the postmodern if you will; it was going to happen whatever name we found for it. As the world expanded and the global village arrived on our doorsteps, as repressed and under-represented minorities found their voices, as pluralism became first a fact and then a virtue, meaning became pluriform. Not interpretation, but interpretations must now be the commentator's goal, and the more of them, if not the merrier, then the richer, the more sensitive, the more rounded the commentary becomes. What we are looking for nowadays in a commentary, I decided, is not the authority of the authorial voice (which author might indeed be a tyro, as I myself was when I wrote on Esther), not a tightness of interpretation, but: .. .A Symphony of Readers' Voices. Or perhaps, a cacophony. Those readers who have been reading our book of Esther (and the rest of the Bible) over all these centuries (millennia, even) will not necessarily have been singing from the same hymn sheet. Some of those readers would gladly have poured boiling oil over others, and a majority will have done their utmost to discredit the interpretations of all the rest. But a subtle chefd'orchestre, which is what commentators of the future must model themselves on, especially a chef of the atonal variety, will find symphony in this melange of voices, and rejoice, if not at every contribution made in the name of biblical interpretation, at least in their very variety. Once, it was enough to be yourself as you read and commentated on the Bible. Today, though, we do not read in private; we are all spokespersons for our reading communities, torchbearers for pressure groups and interest groups of every kind. What's more, standing over the shoulders of these busy reading communities to which we are attached whether we like it or not, know it or not, are the denizens and the guardians of the various reading traditions that stretch back in time—scholarly traditions and ethnic traditions and religious traditions that taught us how to read, brought those reading communities contemporary with us into being.

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It is a signal feature of our age that whole tribes of readers, from every century since the biblical books were written, are being brought back to life in a mass resurrection of the footnoted. Kimchi and Rashi, Augustine and Gregory and Thomas, Luther and Calvin and Oecolampadius, who yesterday belonged to the history of interpretation, have today become our contemporaries. If ethnicity and gender make no difference to the validity of your interpretation (since there are no valid interpretations, only adopted or 'bought' ones; cf. Clines 1993), why should deadness? Bring the old-timers back into the commentators' conversazione (dressed in period costume, of course, to show we haven't lost our sense of historical context), for they too are readers, and our business is with readers, not with Tightness. Let us surround ourselves with a vast cloud of witnesses to the meanings of the text, relish their infinite variety, and celebrate the fecundity of our classic text that has given birth to all these readings. And while we are about it, since we are opening up the circle of readers to scholars of every age, let us not restrict it by demanding a PhD (or equivalent) of everyone entitled to join our conversation. Let's extend a ... Welcome to All Kinds of Readers. Commentators are in the business of interpretation, which is to say reading, and are in principle doing nothing different from what readers of all descriptions, readers good, bad and indifferent, have been doing with the same text all through history. Let us not assume therefore that we can learn only from learned readers, which means, readers who have been trained to read in a certain way, readers who are not allowed by their profession to read in the ways unprofessional readers do. I do not slight professionals. I know, when it comes to brain surgery, I would rather have my head in the hands of a professional. On the other hand, for other complaints of the head that need sorting out, I am not so sure about professionals, Freudian, Jungian or Gestalt. And there are heart problems for which the last person you want is an MD. In fact, I have come to believe that, if I exclude from my bookshelves and my heap of photocopies the works of non-professional readers, I do myself a disservice. I restrict my field of vision and predetermine what will count as valuable and interesting readings. Look at the bibliographies with which we commentators have been accustomed to adorn our commentaries. At the same time as showing off to impressionable readers how much learning we have picked up from the academic, textual, linguistic,

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orientalist, Christian-theological (for the most part) resources we have been reading, what we are silently admitting, to another kind of (more perceptive) reader, is our imperviousness to rhetoric, poetry, literature, psychology, philosophy and art—to say nothing of the relative subjugation of our own individuality in the interests of a common 'objective' language of discourse. This does not do us or our texts a favour. But if our angle of vision is to be enlarged, so also must be the scope, and, yes, the size of our commentaries. Whereupon I invoke a .. .Hail to the Poly-Commentary. In a vision I have seen the commentary of the future, and (unlike the Anchor Bible) it is not thick but thin, its colour is silver, it rolls like the wheels of Ezekiel's chariot, and the number of its letters is six hundred and fifty thousands of thousands. It is a CD—unless perhaps it is even more insubstantial, and is an internet site on a server in a place you have never heard of. The commentary of the future, in my vision, is a resource, a treasury, a showcase, a celebration, of all that the biblical text can generate. Rather than leading inward, to the one true meaning of the text buried like a pearl at the heart of the cornucopia of words that have been spoken and written about the text, the commentary leads outward, to the multiple meanings the text has engendered in its manifold readers and the as yet unrealized potentialities of the text for meaning. If the text is, as Umberto Eco once called it, a machine for generating interpretations, the commentary that will suit the text must be a poly-commentary, multivoiced, indeterminate, divergent, suggestive and limitless—an infinite set of variations on the biblical text. All great music is variations. Antonio Diabelli, composer and entrepreneurial music publisher, sent his vivacious waltz tune around to almost all the composers of his day in the Austrian empire, asking them to write him a variation on it. Four years later, Beethoven, no great time-keeper, delivered his wonderful Diabelli Variations, a work not of one but of 33 variations, lasting 45 minutes, his last major work for the piano and his greatest, one of the key masterpieces of Western music. I think of the biblical text as Diabelli's tune, begging to be transposed into as many keys as possible, transformed rhythmically, tonally, in mood and in spirit; the variations may be provocative, playful or profound, but never more than variations on an original, always identifiably in conversation with the original and coming to rest in the end with the original, where it all started and by which it is forever, in its entirety, bounded.

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The Book of Esther in Modern Research

The commentary as a hypertext collection of the original plus all its variations—it is not a new idea. The classic rabbinic Bible was hypertext devant la lettre. In the centre of the page, the text, and flowing around it the interpretation of the Targum and the commentaries of the scholars, the biblical text and the commentaries on the same page, the work of the creative artist and of its readers distinguishable but nonetheless of the same substance. As with hypertexts everywhere, of course, the reader was constantly seduced into reading what one never intended to, spending yet another minute checking out Rashi or pondering over what the ancient dragoman had written in the Targum. Reading can never be linear and is perforce lateral, each text always in relation to the others—and the thinking that resulted from the reading is of necessity lateral thinking, associative and dialogic, reader-involving. Hypertext is a cool medium, in Marshall McLuhan's terms, providing you with questions and possibilities rather than with answers and foregone conclusions, the opposite of television and the traditional novel (McLuhan 1964: 22-35). And, even with ancient hypertext, you could never encounter the Bible pure and simple, for the biblical text always stood in the midst of a throng of admirers and interlocutors. Perhaps in a way you could say that the biblical texts already included all their commentaries within themselves, like the iridescent feathers of a peacock's tail, as the Irish theologian Scotus Erigena put it when he argued that Holy Scripture contains an infinite number of meanings within itself. Nowadays we might say, less imaginatively, that the study of the Bible is at the same time the study of its interpretations, which is the study of its readers. How to make a hypertext commentary, a poly-commentatorial set of variations on Esther, which could intrigue surfers on the Web? To give some reality to my imagination I chose, almost at random, one verse on which to spawn my vision. Esther 7.4 reads: For we are sold, I and my people, to be destroyed, to be slain, and to be annihilated. If we had been sold merely as slaves, men and women, I would have held my peace; for our affliction is not to be compared with the loss to the king.

For this verse, as for every other in the book, so I suppose, I was able to offer a set of commentatorial choices: 1. Interactive 2. Commentary 3. Translation 4. Hebrew

CLINES Esther and the Future of the Commentary 5. 6. 7.

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The Arts Intertexts Bibliography

There is no correct order in which to visit these elements of the polycommentary. There is no need to consider all of them, and readers are entirely free to browse as they choose. Because the material is hypertext, organized as a website, readers are in control of the reading experience, and can read for all they are worth, for as long as they like. In the Appendix to this paper, I have reproduced some of the materials of this website. Who will read such a commentary, one may well ask, incalculably wordier than any commentary of our day? No one. No one will read every word, any more than they do of the telephone directory, the Encyclopaedia Britannica or the World Wide Web. But everyone who uses it can find and read what they want, and be perpetually tempted to read more than they thought they wanted, wander down avenues they didn't realize existed, waste time (i.e. enjoy themselves) with the text rather than efficiently pinpoint the answer to the question with which they had logged on. That is, I suggest, the future of the commentary—the future of commentary writing and the future of commentary reading, both of them transformed by reconceiving the commentary as hypertext. APPENDIX 1. Interactive I imagine some readers might like to be guided through a dialogue with the text, not being told the 'answers', but having an opportunity to see how the text raises questions, time to think how one would answer them oneself, and a chance to see how someone else might answer them. Thus, I ask, Why does Esther say, We are sold [in the passive voice]? Who has sold them? 2. Why does she say soldi Has money changed hands? 3. Why does she say, I and my people! She is a member of her people. Would not my people mean the same thing? 4. Why does she say destroyed.. .slain.. .annihilated? Do they not all mean the same thing? 1.

Users of the poly-commentary can reflect on these question for themselves before peeking at the answers this commentator offers, such as:

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The Book of Esther in Modern Research To Question 1, I answer: Well, the king has effectively sold them to Haman, who offered (and presumably paid) the king money for them. Esther can hardly say, You have sold them, for that would sound like an accusation. Anyway, her point is not who has sold them, but the fact that they have been sold. To Question 2,1 answer: Yes, Haman has pledged to give the king 10,000 talents of silver if he will allow him to exterminate the Jews. And on the screen is the text of the passage where that is said: (Est. 3.8) Then Haman said to King Ahasuerus, 'There is a certain people scattered abroad and dispersed among the peoples in all the provinces of your kingdom; their laws are different from those of every other people, and they do not keep the king's laws, so that it is not for the king's profit to tolerate them. (9) If it please the king, let it be decreed that they be destroyed, and I will pay ten thousand talents of silver into the hands of those who have charge of the king's business, that they may put it into the king's treasuries.' (10) So the king took his signet ring from his hand and gave it to Haman the Agagite, the son of Hammedatha, the enemy of the Jews. To Question 4,1 answer: She is picking up the exact language in which the decree of extermination had been issued by Haman in the king's name. It sounds like formal, legal language, the language of a royal decree. And on the screen is the text of the passage where that is said: (Est. 3.11) And the king said to Haman, 'The money is given to you, the people also, to do with them as it seems good to you'. (12) Then the king's secretaries were summoned on the thirteenth day of the first month, and an edict, according to all that Haman commanded, was written to the king's satraps and to the governors over all the provinces and to the princes of all the peoples, to every province in its own script and every people in its own language; it was written in the name of King Ahasuerus and sealed with the king's ring. (13) Letters were sent by couriers to all the king's provinces, to destroy, to slay, and to annihilate all Jews, young and old, women and children, in one day, the thirteenth day of the twelfth month, which is the month of Adar, and to plunder their goods.

2. Commentary Here is the place where the user will find many commentaries on the text, from different periods and perspectives, arranged in these categories: (1) Rabbinic, (2) Traditional, (3) Popular, (4) Scientific. Under Rabbinic the user will see, for example:

CLINES Esther and the Future of the Commentary YosefLekach As slaves and servant-girls. Esther said to the king: Had my people been enslaved, I would not have objected, for the Jews were warned in the Torah that if they sin they will be sold to their enemies. Your punishment, Ahasuerus, would not have been great for you would have been instrumental in fulfilling the prophecy. But now you have decreed the complete extermination of the Jews, something the Torah never prophesied. For such a deed your punishment would have been enormous. The sar I enemy who instigated the decree did not concern himself with nzq hmlk I the damage to the king that would result in the form of divine retribution. Rashi The adversary is not worthy of the king's damage, i.e. he is not concerned with the king's damage. Had he been concerned with the king's welfare he would have advised him to sell the Jews and keep the money, or keep them—and their descendants—as perpetual slaves. YosefLekach Of course Esther was not suggesting that her people should be sold as slaves! She merely wanted to stress the evil intent of the adversary in not having made this suggestion to the king. Ibn Ezra The adversary was not concerned with the financial damage to the king resultant from the enormous loss of tax revenue.

Under Traditional the user will find, for example: Cornelius Cornelii a Lapide For we are delivered, I and my people, that we should be destroyed, put to death and perish. Would that we had been sold as slaves and serving-girls! It would have been a tolerable evil, and I would have held my peace even as I wept. But now there is our enemy, whose cruelty rebounds against the king. WOULD THAT WE HAD BEEN SOLD AS SLAVES AND SLAVEGIRLS] so that, our life being spared, we could at least have been servants and serving girls to the king and to the Persians! BUT NOW THERE IS OUR ENEMY] who wishes to deprive me and the Jews and everyone of life, WHOSE CRUELTY therefore REBOUNDS AGAINST THE KING, for by his edict of death to the Jews, who fill his treasury with enormous tribute, and who provide many services to the king and from whom his own safety and the safety of the kingdom can enlist

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The Book of Esther in Modern Research many valiant soldiers; nay, whom he can set as wise rulers over his provinces, like Daniel with his three associates. From these and many other benefits from the Jews that you can perceive—to say nothing of greater benefits you do not yet perceive—Haman is depriving you, O Ahasuerus. He is plotting a grave and lasting calumny against you among all peoples that you would destroy our innocent race, a race that has earned your goodwill. Against you therefore will the cruelty of Haman in seeking the extermination of the Jews rebound in the highest degree, (a Lapide 1865)

Under Popular the user will find, for example: McConville [Esther's] only hope lies in displaying the villainy of her antagonist in all its hideousness. With this in view she makes reference to the sordid financial transaction that had accompanied the decree (perhaps the king had taken the money after all, despite his disclaimer, 3.11, which would then have to be seen as conventional eastern politeness). (McConville 1985) Bjornard [Esther's] petition follows an interesting Near Eastern tradition of bargaining. If they had been merely sold away as slaves, Esther would not have complained. Then their worry would be less than the strain and stress burdening the great emperor. And their loss of freedom would be smaller than the king's loss of so many loyal subjects. But since they are slated to be annihilated, she must be permitted to beg for her life. Stafford Wright [Esther] begs for the life of herself and her people. She knows the terms of the transaction, and the loss in money which the king would sustain if he went back on Haman's plan with its accompanying bribe (4; cf. 3.9); but it is not even a question of slavery; it is life or death (4). (Marshall and Stafford Wright 1978)

Under Scientific the user will find, for example: Moore In this verse Esther justifies her requests in vs. 3. Unfortunately, her rationale is far from clear, probably because of corruption in the MT (see below). we've been sold. An allusion to the monetary transaction between Haman and the king (see First NOTE on iii 9), although many scholars understand 'sold' to be used here in the sense of 'delivered over to' (as in Deut xxxii 30; Judg ii 14, iii 8, iv 2, 9, x 7). (Moore 1971: 70)

CLINES Esther and the Future of the Commentary Baldwin For we are sold is a reference to financial gain offered by Haman as an inducement to the king to grant his request (3.9). The verb was not always used literally (cf. Deut. 32.30; Judg 2.14; 4.9; Ps 44.12), but in the light of the money transaction in this case it was doubly appropriate. To be destroyed, to be slain, to be annihilated: the verbs are exactly those of the decree despite the difference required by the English translation (cf. 3.13). To emphasize the enormity of the plot it was appropriate to introduce the idea that the queen and her people might have been sold as slaves, as though that would have occasioned no protest. The meaning of the last clause of verse 4 is problematic for several reasons. The word translated affliction (Heb. sar) can also mean 'enemy' (RSV 'adversary'), and there is no indication whose affliction is meant. The word for loss renders a Hebrew term which occurs only here in the Old Testament, and whose meaning is therefore uncertain, though in rabbinic Hebrew it means 'damage', 'injury'. The translator here also has to be interpreter, hence the wide differences between versions: e.g. 'no such distress would justify disturbing the king' (Niv); 'for then our plight would not be such as to injure the king's interests' (NEB); 'I would have kept quiet and not bothered you about it' (GNB, a very free translation). The older interpretation appears in the margin of NIV, 'but the compensation our adversary offers cannot be compared with the loss the king would suffer', a sense which JB expresses very well: 'but as things are, it will be beyond the means of the persecutor to make good the loss that the king is about to sustain'. This reference to the king's concerns is good psychology and the inference that people are to be valued above money is in keeping with Esther's cause; so, until more light is shed on the meaning, the last two translations quoted have most to commend them, with RSV a close runner-up. (Baldwin 1984) Clines we are sold: Esther can hardly say that it is in fact the king himself who has sold them (see 3.9-11), and so she must put the remark in the passive. She has been well primed by Mordecai, and knows both of the sum of money offered by Haman (see 4.7) and the exact terms of the edict prepared by Haman (destroyed...slain...annihilated; cf. 3.13). The reason why she would have kept her peace if the Jews' plight had simply been to be sold merely as slaves—a common enough occurrence (cf. Neh 5.8)—is that such affliction would be not to be compared with the loss to the king. This can only mean it would be too trivial a matter to bother the king (on nzq 'trouble', see H.L. Ginsberg, VTS 16 [1967], p. 81; R. Gordis, JBL 95 [1976], pp. 55f [= Moore, Studies, pp. 420f.]). NEB has 'would not be such as to injure the king's interests', but this does not adequately express the force of soweh 'appropriate, fitting'. (Clines 1984: 311)

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3. Translations This is where translations ancient and modern may be found. Nothing arms the English reader better for the work of exegesis than studying the amazing variety of translations available. The more scholarly reader will also benefit from having the ancient versions at hand. The poly-commentator will not refrain from engagement with the variety of translations. Attached to every screen, as the attentive reader will find, there are explanations, comments and criticisms of the translations. 4. Hebrew There will be readers who want to read the biblical passage in the original, find help with the Hebrew, study the language and grammar and textcritical problems. A whole section of the commentary will be entirely for their benefit. 5. The Arts So that the contribution of the arts to the process of reading should not be overlooked, this section brings to bear materials from (1) poetry, (2) film, (3) images and (4) music. For this text dealing with slavery and the contemplation of slavery, it is not difficult to summon up elements from the visual and literary arts that can colour and enhance the significance of the text. 6. Intertexts This is the place for a variety of materials the poly-commentator chooses to present to the reader in order to provoke further reflection through the juxtaposition of the biblical text with other texts (which are in most cases not influenced literarily by the biblical text). The selections under The Arts already are intertexts, but in the present section I have placed texts I would like the reader to consider as they meditate on the text. What I have created already is (1) a short list of literary quotations on the theme of slavery: Classic Quotations on Slavery So every bondman in his own hand bears The power to cancel his captivity. —Shakespeare, Julius Caesar I.ii.101

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What more often in nations grown corrupt, And by their vices brought to servitude, Than to love bondage more than liberty, Bondage with ease than strenuous liberty. —Milton, Samson Agonistes 268 A cat pent up becomes a lion. —Italian proverb Man is born free; and everywhere he is in chains. —Rousseau, The Social Contract (1762), 1.1 (trans. G.D.H. Cole) He who is conceived in a cage Yearns for the cage. —Yevgeny Yevtushenko, 'Monologue of a Blue Fox on an Alaskan Animal Farm', quoted in The New York Times, 18 January 1968 This is what it means To be a slave: to be abused and bear it, Compelled by violence to suffer wrong. —Euripides, Hecuba (c. 425 BCE) (trans. William Arrowsmith) Whatever day Makes man a slave, takes half his worth away. —Homer, Odyssey 17.392 (trans. Alexander Pope) Freedom is indivisible, and when one man is enslaved, all are not free. —John F. Kennedy, address, West Berlin, 26 June 1963 This is servitude, To serve the unwise. —Milton, Paradise Lost (1667) 6.178 Servitude debases men to the point where they end up liking it. —Luc de Clapiers, Marquis de Vauvenargues, Reflections and Maxims (1746) 22

And (2), any other texts that might seem relevant to the biblical text, as for example the following letter to The Times (of London):

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The Book of Esther in Modern Research Sir The Prime Minister's proposal to commemorate the victims of slavery (report, March 3) is welcome, not least because one of the most pressing issues of the new millennium is the continuation of this horror. Today, tens of millions of people remain enslaved around the world, whilst of the more than 100 million trapped in bonded labour, many are vulnerable children. This country needs to remember that much of the wealth which created 'Great Britain' was blood money in the truest sense. I believe that the greatest tribute would be for Britain once again to lead the world in campaigning against slavery.

Yours etc. ZERBANOO GIFFORD Director The ASHA Foundation Herga House, London Road Harrow-on-the-HillHAl 3JG The Times, 9 March 2000

ESTHER IN TEXT- AND LITERARY-CRITICAL PARADISE Kristin De Troyer In the first part of this study I will offer a short introduction to the textand literary-critical problems of the book of Esther. Then, I will briefly characterize the methods used in Esther research. Next, I will present a case study: the end of ch. 2 of the book of Esther in relation to Addition A. (For convenience, 'Addition' will be abbreviated to 'Add.' when modified by the conventional unit markers—A, E, etc.) I have chosen the problem of the text of ch. 2 and its relationship to Add. A in the hope that I will initiate a discussion and to challenge the reader to reflect on issues related to Esther in text- and literary-critical paradise. With this contribution, I also hope to demonstrate my approach to the textual and literary criticism of the book of Esther. 1. A Brief Introduction into the Text- and Literary-Critical Problems of the Books of Esther The book of Esther comes in different shapes and sizes. First there is the Hebrew book of Esther. It tells the story of how Esther and Mordecai managed to avoid the destruction of their people. The story was originally written in Hebrew. It can be found in the Masoretic Text (MT) of the Bible. Then, someone translated the Hebrew story into Greek. Hence, all those who no longer read or spoke Hebrew but were literate in Greek were able to read the story. The Greek story is characterized by its six Additions. Someone—maybe the translator, maybe a later interpreter or reviser— decided to add six pieces of additional material to the translation of the Hebrew book. This longer text became part of the Greek Bible, called the Septuagint (LXX). There is, however, also a second Greek text of the book of Esther. The second Greek text is known under many names: the AlphaText (or AT), the Lucianic Text (or L) and, of course, the second Greek text. In this study, I will use the abbreviation AT to refer to it. The AT is at first sight a bit shorter than the LXX. It also has the Additions. Moreover, it has some material that cannot be found in either the MT or the LXX.

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The following questions must be asked: Where do the differences between the texts come from? How do the differences influence the texts and their story? Why are there three different texts of the same story? Moreover, to which text were which Additions added? Can one decide whether the author/translator of the text or a later editor has added the pieces? A second series of questions is connected with the first and concerns the background of the Additions: Were they originally written in Hebrew or in Greek? Which ones were in Hebrew, which in Greek? Next, and for me even more important questions arise: Can we sketch the history of the Additions taking into account the history of the texts? Can we say something about the history and the relationship between the texts which also takes into account the complex history of the Additions and their relationship to whatever text? 2. Methods There are two roads that can be taken in Esther research. The first road tries to explain the AT as completely or partially based on a Hebrew text that is slightly, very, or completely different from the MT. Going down this road implies the reconstruction of a text which has hitherto not been found anywhere, not in manuscripts, not in Qumran. Many scholars have taken this road. I, however, have taken another road. Emanuel Tov inspired me, although he ended up following the first road. In his book, The Text-Critical Use of the Septuagint in Biblical Research, he writes: 'Although Torrey's theory has not been accepted, it is certainly possible that either the LXX or the "Lucianic" version of Esth., or both, reflect texts that differ recensionally from MT' (Tov 1997: 225). In his 1982 article on Esther, he writes: As it has been established that L is based on the LXX, many deviations of L from MT must have resulted from the translator's free attitude to his Hebrew and/or Greek Vorlage or from a Hebrew Vorlage which is different from MT. However, prior to this decision one should decide whether L had independent access to a Hebrew text different from MT. (Tov 1982: 7)

While I agree with and respect Tov tremendously, I am more inclined to exhaust the idea of the author of AT's rather free reworking of the LXX before I would subscribe to the postulation of a different Hebrew Vorlage, as Tov would have it. The difference in approach might be explained as follows: Should one explain the differences between texts as differences in their Vorlagen, or

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should one explain the differences as the results of editorial reworking of a text? I hold the position that if one can explain the text as a redactional reworking of another existing text, one need not reconstruct a non-existent different text. In a sense, I apply the rule that if a text is an exegesis, then one should not retro vert the text and use it for the reconstruction of a Hebrew text. Tov stressed this rule in his text-critical book (Tov 1997: 39-40). My choice results in a sense from a larger debate that is currently going on at the borders of both text criticism and literary criticism. We readily acknowledge the different layers in a text—or at least the redactional reworking of a so-called final text—and we recognize that in some cases the MT provides a more recent text than the Vorlage of the LXX. Sometimes the text of Qumran or the LXX has kept an older stage of a biblical book. In those cases, the borderline between text criticism and literary criticism is no longer clear. And hence, we can no longer entirely rely on these texts for text-critical purposes. I emphasize the ongoing process of editing texts, and I can see no reason not to accept that this process continues within different versions of a text, be it in Greek, Syriac, Latin, Coptic or English and Chinese. This statement, hopefully, also makes it clear that I acknowledge the existence of different texts (or text traditions), but that I will have recourse to another text or Vorlage only when all exegetical editorial reworkings of a text have been taken into consideration. In our case, the study of Esther, I will always first analyze the Hebrew text as such. Then, I will see whether or not the Vorlage of the LXX was indeed the MT. Only then will I proceed to investigate the AT. 3. A Case Study: What is the Matter with Esther 2.21-23 and Add. A? a. The Texts1 MT 2.21-23: (21)

(22 (23)

1. In what follows, the BHS is used for the Hebrew MT and Hanhart's (1983) edition is used for the Greek LXX. English translations are by the author unless otherwise indicated.

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The Book of Esther in Modern Research In those days, while Mordecai was sitting at the king's gate, Bigthan and Teresh, two of the king's eunuchs, who guarded the threshold, became angry and conspired to assassinate King Ahasuerus. But the matter came to the knowledge of Mordecai and he told it to Queen Esther, and Esther told the king in the name of Mordecai. When the affair was investigated and found to be so, both the men were hanged on gallows. It was recorded in the book of the annals in the presence of the king. (NRSV) LXX 2.21-23:

Now the king's eunuchs, who were chief bodyguards, were angry because of Mordecai's advancement, and they plotted to kill King Artaxerxes. The matter became known to Mordecai, and he warned Esther, who in turn revealed the plot to the king. He investigated the two eunuchs and hanged them. Then the king ordered a memorandum to be deposited in the royal library in praise of the goodwill shown by Mordecai. (NRSV)

These verses are not present in the AT. However, Add. A in the AT and in the LXX has a short story about the incident. This incident is related in the second part of Add. A. As a matter of fact, Add. A has three parts: a short introduction of Mordecai, then a dream, and then the discovery by Mordecai of the attempt to kill the king. I will refer, however, to the dream as part one of the Addition and the discovery of the assassination attempt as part two. LXX Add. A. 12-17:

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Now Mordecai took his rest in the courtyard with Gabatha and Tharra, the two eunuchs of the king who kept watch in the courtyard. He overheard their conversation and inquired into their purposes, and learned that they were preparing to lay hands on King Artaxerxes; and he informed the king concerning them. Then the king examined the two eunuchs, and after they had confessed it, they were led away to execution. The king made a permanent record of theses things, and Mordecai wrote an account of them. And the king ordered Mordecai to serve in the court and rewarded him for these things. But Haman son of Hammedatha, a Bougaean, who was in great honor with the king, determined to injure Mordecai and his people because of the two eunuchs of the king. (NRSV)

The AT version connects the first part of the Addition, in which Mordecai has a dream, with the part discussed in this contribution. AT Add. A.I 1-18:

The interpretation would become plain to him upon the day when Mordecai slept in the king's courtyard beside Astaos and Thedeutes the two eunuchs of the king. He overheard their words and their plots, how they were planning to lay hands on Ahasuerus the king to put him to death. But Mordecai, being well disposed [to the king], made a report concerning them. Then the king examined the two eunuchs and found the words of Mordecai [to be true]. And when the eunuchs confessed they were led to execution. Ahasuerus the king made a written record of these matters; and Mordecai['s name] was written in the king's book in order that these matters should be

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The Book of Esther in Modern Research remembered. And the king gave command concerning Mordecai that he should serve in the king's court and should keep watch conspicuously on every door. And he gave him, because of these things, Haman the son of Hammedatha, a Macedonian, who stood before the king; and Haman sought to injure Mordecai and all his people because he had spoken about the eunuchs to the king, so that they were executed. (Translation by Clines 1984)

b. The Witnesses The witnesses to the MT—Hebrew manuscripts as well as the Targumim, the Syriac text and the Vulgate—do not have Add. A. All witnesses to the LXX have both Add. A and the last verses of ch. 2. The four AT Mss do not have vv. 19-23 of ch. 2. The Vetus Latina has both Add. A and the verses in ch. 2. Almost all of the Vetus Latina manuscripts, however, have only vv. 1-11 of Add. A. One manuscript, Codex Monacensis, has both the beginning and the second part of Add. A. Josephus does not offer Add. A, or Add. F. But, as Moore correctly observes, 'Whether A and F...were lacking in the particular text Josephus used or whether he deliberately omitted them from his paraphrase is unknown, although the latter possibility seems the more probable' (Moore 1977: 165-66 n. 33). Josephus does have a text parallel to 2.19-23. Moreover, Josephus adds a fourth person to the story, Barnabazos, who acts as an intermediary between Mordecai and the king (Ant. 11.207-208). c. The Opinions (1) Torrey (1944). Although Charles C. Torrey states that AT Add. A and Add. F stem from the LXX, it is not clear to me whether or not he makes a distinction between the dream in Add. A and the rest of Add. A. (2) Cook (1969:370-71). Herbert Cook argues that vv. 1-11 are clearly of Greek origin, while vv. 12-17 are of Hebrew origin. (3) Moore (1973: 388). Carey Moore maintains that w. 4-10 are Semitic in origin (eventually also vv. 1-3 as well as Add. F). They were added to the Hebrew story of Esther. Addition A.I 1-17 is clearly Greek and might have been added to the Greek translation as late as the second century CE. (4) Tov (1982:12). According to Emanuel Tov, the AT omitted the section in ch. 2 because it was already told in Add. A. Tov stresses that the AT forms an 'organic whole'. Thus, Add. A was in the other Hebrew story.

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(5) Nickelsburg (1984:135-38). While George Nickelsburg recognizes the distinction between Add. A. 12-17 and the remainder of Add. A, he maintains that these verses are an expansion of LXX 2.21-23 and that 2.21-23 were thus adapted. (6) dines (1984: 105). David Clines claims that MT 2.21-23 was composed by the author of MT, 'for the allusion cries out for expansion, the kind of expansion provided by MT in its 2.21 -23. The narrative of the MT is a little masterpiece, which is hard to imagine being deliberately omitted by any later recension. Its absence from AT is best explained as due to the priority of AT's Vorlage to MT.' (7) Tigay (1985: 60). In his article 'Conflation as a Redactional Technique', Jeffrey Tigay comments on Add. A. 12-16 and its relation to LXX 2.21-23. He lists the differences between the LXX and Add. A. 'In the context of the LXX', Tigay writes, 'these differences do not make the episodes contradictory because they are placed at different points in the story and appear as two different incidents, between which differences are to be expected'. He continues: 'The one detail that would have made the episodes mutually exclusive is the names of the eunuchs in 2.21. We know from the Hebrew text of 2.21 and 6.2 that these were Bigtan and Teresh, the same two who were executed after the incident in A. 12-16.' He concludes: 'This confirms that the two episodes were originally variants of one and the same episode'. Following a hint of Elias Bickerman (1950: 113-14), however, he argues that the differences between the two episodes 'must have convinced the Greek translator (or the redactor of his Hebrew Vorlage) that these were separate incidents' (Tigay 1985: 60). Therefore, the LXX omitted the names of the eunuchs in LXX 2.21-23. Moreover, Tigay notes that according to LXX 6.2-3, Mordecai was not yet rewarded for the discovery of the plot, and thus, 'the incident for which Mordecai was awarded must have happened earlier; accordingly that incident was moved up to an earlier location'. The fact that the AT omitted the section in LXX 2.21-23 'implies that 2.21-23 was already recognized in antiquity as a doublet of A. 12-16, just as the other dropped details were recognized as repetitions of matters covered in the additions' (Tigay 1985: 61). (8) Haelewyck (1985). Jean-Claude Haelewyck claims that the second part of Add. A was added to Add. A in the first stage of the AT on the basis of MT 2.21-23. The AT got the first part of Add. A from the so-called GUI, the Vorlage of the Vetus Latina.

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(9) Fox (1991b: 12). Michael Fox is the first one who notes that the AT has connected the dream in Add. A with Mordecai's discovery of the conspiracy. By so doing, the AT avoids the contradiction in LXX 2.21-23, which sets the discovery in the seventh year rather than in the second year (Add. A.I). The AT, however, omits the scene in 2.21-23. (10) Kossmann (1999). Contrary to Hans Bardtke (1973: 15-62), Ruth Kossmann claims that AT Add. A. 12-16a is the older part of the Addition. It represents the older story about the two eunuchs, which is summarized in LXX 2.21-23. The LXX has, therefore, both the longer story and the summarized text. The problem can be phrased in two ways: Why does the LXX tell the story about the conspiracy twice? Or one could ask: Why does the AT only mention it once, like the MT—although it is another version of the same event? Clines and to a certain extent Haelewyck state that the AT does not have the story in ch. 2 because its Vorlage did not have it. Kossmann considers the text of ch. 2 as secondary and states that AT Add. A.12-16a belongs to the oldest stratum of the Haman-Mordecai source. According to Fox and Tigay, this section of ch. 2 is not in the AT because the AT avoided narrating a similar story twice. The AT, therefore, has only the event told in Add. A. Haelewyck, however, claims that the second part of Add. A is based on the MT. Nickelsburg sees it as derived from the LXX. Fox and Tigay stress that because the LXX has the story in two places, the LXX adapted the text of ch. 2. Nickelsburg maintains the same position. So, where does Add. A. 12-17 come from? Is it derived from the MT (Haelewyck), or from the LXX (Fox, Tigay, Nickelsburg)? Why is it found only once in the AT? Was it because the AT avoided it (Fox and Tigay), or because it was not in its Vorlage (Clines), or because it was told only once in the original story (Kossmann)? d. A Survey of Kossmann's Arguments In her attempt to reconstruct the Haman-Mordecai source, one of the original sources of the Esther narrative, Kossmann (1999: 76-104) analyzes Add. A. 12-17 and chs. 2 and 6. Kossmann gives arguments to prove that the AT Add. A.12-16a is the oldest part (compared to 2.21-23 of the LXX and MT) and also the oldest form (compared to the LXX) of the text, and that it is independent of MT 2.21-23 and therefore useful to her reconstruc-

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tion. I will analyze her arguments. Then I will offer my position on the second part of Add. A and its relation to MT and LXX 2.21-23. In a first section (Kossmann 1999: 82-86), Kossmann asks whether or not Add. A. 12-17 witnesses to a more original form of the conspiracy and its discovery story. According to Kossmann, the longer version is the older version. Moreover, the fact that the AT does not have the second story in ch. 2 proves the first one to be the more original. Next, Kossmann lists where the LXX is clearly influenced by the MT (e.g. how the eunuchs are labeled is very much the same in the LXX and in the MT). LXX Add. A (with r|ouxa£co) better represents the Hebrew DIZT. This is also the case for the expression 'to lay the hands on'. Kossmann notes, however, that the AT better represents the intention of the eunuchs by adding 'in order to kill him'. The AT also contains a plus in Add. A. 13, describing Mordecai as being in a good mood. Next, she notes that the MT has added Queen Esther to 2.22a, and that it has the king examining the case, whereas both AT and LXX add 'of the eunuchs', clarifying the case. She goes on to point out that the AT adds 'he found Mordecai's word to be true' in Add. A. 14b. Next, she points to the development in the three texts in 2.23b/Add. A. 15—namely, from 'the king writing' in MT, to 'and both the king and Mordecai wrote' in LXX, to finally that 'the king writes and that about Mordecai was written' in the AT. Kossmann concludes that the LXX has taken over the texts of both the AT and the MT. Finally, she points to the minus of the MT vis-a-vis the LXX and AT Add. A. 16 at the end. After listing these differences, she concludes that there is no direct relationship between the AT and the MT, and that the MT strongly influenced the LXX. However, as the LXX also has elements in common with the AT, it holds a position between the AT and the MT. In a later section, Kossmann compares MT 2.21-23 with LXX 2.21-23 and shows that one cannot understand the LXX without Add. A. Kossmann argues that LXX 2.21-23 is based on AT Add. A and MT 2.21-23. Not only is Add. A in the LXX a secondary text, the story in ch. 2 is also secondary. Again, she lists the differences and similarities between AT Add. A and the text in ch. 2. She claims that the LXX'S plus in 2.21, that the eunuchs were angry because of Mordecai's promotion, does not make sense if one reads it with only LXX Add. A in the background. Next, the LXX does not use the same expression as in Add. A—namely, 'laying on of the hands'— but 'they sought to kill'. Finally, the LXX resembles the AT in 2.23 when it comes to describing the king's investigation of the two eunuchs. All this points to the AT's and the MT'S both influencing the LXX, thus making the

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LXX secondary as compared to the AT. She concludes that LXX 2.21-23 was indeed composed with the help of MT 2.21 -23 and AT Add. A. Therefore, Kossmann continues, AT Add. A is the more original form of the Addition. LXX 2.21-23 is a summary of the original longer story found in the Addition. Finally, the MT has incorporated the latter summary into its canonical text (Kossmann 1999: 87-89). In the next section of her study, Kossmann wonders which text belongs to the Haman-Mordecai source: the canonical or the apocryphal text. She notes that the MT reads well without vv. 21-23. Verse 19 is continued in 3.2. Moreover, 2.21-23 introduces a conflict that differs from the conflict in 3.2; thus, w. 21-23 do not fit. Kossmann also refers to Josephus, who offers the story with yet another person as the main character. Not Mordecai or Esther, but Barnabazos discovers the conspiracy. This witness proves the conspiracy-discovery story to be genuine. Kossmann concludes by stating that vv. 21-23 disturb the narrative of MT ch. 2 (Kossmann 1999: 89-94). It is obvious that Kossmann prefers the apocryphal version of the story. In yet another section, Kossmann investigates which version is the more authentic one—that is, which one mirrors the original Haman-Mordecai source: the Addition of the AT or the one of the LXX. She offers two arguments, the first one related to the main issue, the second related to the extent of the original Addition. Her main argument to prove the originality of the Addition in the AT is that Add. A in its LXX form, more specifically Add. A. 15, is dependent on 9.20. Both texts contain 'And Mordecai wrote about these things'. This proves that the LXX is more recent than the AT. Kossmann then comments on the similarity between AT Add. A. 17a, LXX Add. E.10 and LXX 9.24: all these texts add to the name of Haman a second label, 'Hammedatha the Macedonian'. As this is secondary in LXX Add. E and in LXX 9.24, the text in AT Add. A.17a must also be secondary. Next, Kossmann argues that there is an error in AT Add. A.17a. Instead of saying that Mordecai came into the service of Haman, the text reads that Haman came into the service of Mordecai. This does not make sense to Kossmann, and she claims that the AT makes a grammatical error here. She refers to Josephus, who states that Mordecai was not rewarded for telling the king about the conspiracy. She also points to the reading in Josephus and in the LXX that Mordecai is ordered by the king to serve in the courtyard. The fact that this line is in Josephus and the LXX as well as the AT makes the AT suspicious here, and she concludes that the text from AT Add. A.16b-17 is no longer useful for the reconstruction of the

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original source. Hence, she concludes that AT Add. A.I 1-16a is the most original part of the Haman-Mordecai source (Kossmann 1999: 94-97). e. Analysis So far, I have summarized Kossmann's research. I will now make some counter-arguments to Kossmann. I will proceed as follows. First, I will look at MT and LXX 2.21-23 and verify whether or not the Vorlage of the LXX was indeed the Hebrew text of the MT. Then, I will compare ch. 2 with Add. A in its LXX form, and focus on the differences and the problems. Then, I will turn to the AT and focus on Add. A in comparison with LXX Add. A. (1) MT-LXX. First, the LXX says that the eunuchs became angry because of Mordecai's promotion. According to Kossmann, the element of 'anger because of the promotion' is a plus, which does not make sense in the LXX without considering the background of Add. A. The element of anger in the LXX, however, is simply a translation of the MT. Mordecai's promotion is indeed a plus. However, is it true that we can understand it only when we know Add. A? The answer is 'Yes'. Indeed, the LXX refers in ch. 2 to something that was already told in Add. A. Addition A. 16 mentions that the king ordered Mordecai to serve in the courtyard. Moreover, 'the king gave him rewards because of all these things'. Further, the LXX uses the terminology of Add. A at the very beginning of this section in ch. 2. In v. 19, 'Mordecai is serving in the court'; that is exactly what he was told to do in Add. A. 16. The LXX thus deliberately uses the same terminology in ch. 2 as in Add. A. The verb is even found twice in Add. A. In Add. A.2 Mordecai is said to be serving in the court. This element seems out of place; at least it already mentions what Mordecai is told to do later on. Thus, we have in Add. A the same verb, SepaTTEUEtv, used twice, to indicate that Mordecai is serving in the courtyard. The LXX also uses SspaTTEUEiv in 6.10. At the beginning of the section in LXX Add. A, another verb is used: r|ouxa£co ('resting'). Contrary to the LXX, the AT does not mention Mordecai's activity in Add. A.2. Moreover, it has no parallel for 2.19. This demonstrates that the verb SEPQTTEUEIV is used only in Add. A. 16. The AT does not use the verb in the parallel text of 6.10 either, for according to the AT Mordecai had been sitting, mourning and probably also praying in the court since 4.2. Thus it uses a more appropriate verb, as the LXX Add. A did in A. 12. To say that LXX Add. A, when translating r]auxa£co, better represents the Hebrew DET—as Kossmann

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does—is therefore saying too much; that the LXX consistently chooses SspaTTEUE i v only reflects its tendency to be appropriate and consistent. The verb in Add. A. 12 cannot be used to prove the originality of the Addition over that of the text in ch. 2. Looking at the rest of the text, I note that the translation of 2.21's 'to lay hands on' into Greek 'seeking to kill' is one way of saying that one plans to kill someone. The LXX of Esther uses a variety of expressions. The AT has a parallel only for LXX 3.6 and uses avaAioKEiv instead of CXTTOKTEIVEIV. The AT also uses it in the parallel to LXX 9.13, which is AT 7.46. Thus, one could say that avaXioKEiv is typical for the AT. It is, therefore, of no surprise to the present author that the AT uses the same verb in Add. A. 12. Kossmann correctly notes that the AT better represents the intention of the eunuchs. The translation of 2.22's 'telling' into both 'warning' and 'revealing' shows the translator's capacity for choosing the appropriate Greek equivalent. The same holds true for 2.23's 'hanging'. The LXX adequately translates the Hebrew text. What about the translation of 'seeking/investigating' in combination with 'finding to be true'? The Hebrew text reads: 'When the matter was investigated and found to be so'. Kossmann remarks that the verb used by the LXX (ETCX^CO) is the same as the one in AT Add. A. 14. That is correct. Moreover, the LXX Add. A. 14 has a different verb, E£ETCX£CO. Kossmann concludes that the LXX in ch. 2 is dependent on AT Add. A. Both verbs, however, occur only once in the LXX—the first one in Add. A. 14; the second, in LXX 2.23. The only difference between the verbs is the preposition, and LSI notes that the form with the preposition is more common than without. Second, Kossmann notes that the LXX adds some elements that remind her of AT Add. A. 15, where it is said that 'it was written about Mordecai in the king's book in order that these matters should be remembered'. This is different from the MT, where it is simply stated that 'it was written in the book of the matters of the annals in the presence of the king'. The element of 'memory' can also be found in other places in LXX Esther: Add. A. 15; Add. E.23; 9.27, 28, 32; and 10.2. The AT has the same element in all places where it has a parallel to the LXX (Add. A. 15; Add. E.23; 7.49, which is parallel to 9.27; 7.50, which is parallel to 10.2). The plus in 2.23, therefore, not only reminds the reader of the AT, but also of other places in the LXX. One minus in this section is worth noting. The MT of 2.22 reads that Esther told the king 'in the name of Mordecai'. The LXX does not have this element. However, the LXX does have the plus in 2.23 that 'a memoran-

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dum should be deposited in praise of the goodwill of Mordecai'. A similar expression is used in 6.4, again in a plus vis-a-vis the Hebrew text. The LXX thus refers twice to the goodwill of Mordecai: once in ch. 2 and once in ch. 6. The AT does not have a parallel for the two texts. In Add. B.3, however, the AT does mention the goodwill of Haman, as does the LXX. It seems to me as if referring to the goodwill of Mordecai is more characteristic of the LXX than 'in Mordecai's name', which occurs only once in MT Esther. I conclude that the minus of the LXX can be explained by the plus of the LXX in the same verse: not the name of Mordecai is important, but his goodwill must be remembered. I conclude this small section by saying that LXX 2.21 -23 is a good translation of MT 2.21-23. The translator who translated the rest of the book also translated this piece of Esther. There are also similarities between the Additions and the rest of the text of the LXX. This leads me to the second part of my analysis. What is the relationship between the text of 2.21-23 and the Addition? (2) LXX 2.21-23 and LXX Add. A.11-17. The two passages have a similar structure. The readers are informed about the plan of the eunuchs; Mordecai learns about it; the king is told; the king examines the matter and hangs the eunuchs; and something is written down. Addition A includes the location of Mordecai when the eunuchs are plotting. At the same time, the Addition does not mention that the eunuchs are angry. It also sketches how Mordecai verifies what he heard. Moreover, the Addition notes that the eunuchs confess. Then, the Addition elaborates the theme of who is writing what. Here the Addition states that the king orders Mordecai to serve and he also rewards Mordecai. Finally, the Addition includes a sentence about how Haman feels and what he is up to. The question now is: Can we explain the Addition as an embellished version of the same story in ch. 2, or is ch. 2 an abbreviation of the Addition? I will focus on the pluses, minuses and variants of the Addition to determine whether or not these alterations reflect LXX Esther terminology and content. The first element of the Addition that comes to mind is the plus about Mordecai's location: Mordecai was resting in the courtyard together with the two eunuchs of the king who were guarding the courtyard. As already discussed earlier, 'resting' (rjouxcx^co) is used only once in LXX Esther. I think that the LXX avoided using the verb SepaTTEUEiv, for 'the reward to serve' proves to be the outcome of the story and not the beginning. Next, the king's eunuchs are in the Addition 'guarding the courtyard'. Chapter 2

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uses a very infrequent word: cxpxr)OCO|jaTO(j)uAax. It is used twice in the LXX, and only once related to eunuchs. The Addition uses the more common expression (j)uAaaaco. The LXX, however, uses the noun (J)uAa£ only in connection with the women in ch. 2. The verb is not only used in the Addition. It is also used in ch. 6, where the activity of the two eunuchs is labeled with this verb. The LXX thus refers to the eunuchs with the common verb and once (in ch. 2) with an uncommon word. Whether or not the LXX in 6.2 is dependent on the Addition is difficult to say. I would point to the fact that the verb is a common translation of the Hebrew. In this case, it is easier to say that ch. 2 is not dependent on Add. A, for it does not use the verb of the Addition, but selects a seldom used noun. The passage in ch. 2 mentions that the eunuchs were angry because of Mordecai's promotion. Addition A does not mention jealousy as the reason for the eunuchs' conspiracy. I am not even sure that ch. 2 should be read in that way. MT ch. 2 reads that the eunuchs were angry and that they planned to kill the king. Whether or not the two issues are related, I cannot tell. It is, however, obvious that the Addition does not mention the promotion of Mordecai until he is promoted. That the LXX mentions the promotion can be explained only on the basis that the LXX knew Add. A before writing ch. 2. As Tigay points out, the LXX looks at the two events as two separate incidents. Mordecai is rewarded for the first incident; he is ordered to serve in the courtyard and is rewarded by the king. He is, however, not rewarded for the second incident; his name is written in a memo and that is it. Mordecai will be rewarded for the second incident in ch. 6. The anger of the two eunuchs, however, reminds me of the last verse of Add. A. There it is said that Haman is determined to injure Mordecai and his people because of the two eunuchs. The LXX connects Haman with Mordecai at the very beginning of the story. Moreover, it associates Haman's plan to injure Mordecai and his people with the conspiracy and hanging of the two eunuchs. The verb 'to injure' occurs only in Add. A.17, and Add. E.3. Both texts deal with Haman's determination to injure. In ch. 2 nothing is said about Haman's plan, for it will be dealt with in the next chapter. Moreover, the mention of the promotion of Mordecai in LXX 2.21 looks like a set-up for the reader, for in the very first verse of ch. 3 the promotion of Haman is dealt with. It looks as if the LXX added the reference to Mordecai's promotion not only because of Add. A, but also because of ch. 3. Mordecai discovers the conspiracy. It takes one verb in ch. 2 to tell that the conspiracy became visible. The Addition provides the details: Mor-

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decai heard the words, he examines their pursuits; finally, he learns that they are planning to kill the king. The verb used in ch. 2, 5r]Aoco, occurs only here in LXX Esther. Except for the second verb, the verbs of the Addition are also found elsewhere in LXX Esther. The verb 'listening' is even more frequent in the LXX than in the AT. The verb (javSaveiv also occurs in 4.5, again only in the LXX text and not in the AT. The LXX then continues and reports that Mordecai told Esther. The verb aripatVEiv is also used in Add. B.6, by the LXX and the AT. That Esther appears in ch. 2 as a 'detour' should not surprise the reader, for Esther has become queen and is therefore quite close to the king. In Add. A, however, Esther has not yet been chosen as queen, and cannot function as a 'go-between'. It is therefore difficult to say that ch. 2 is dependent on the Addition. It is also not possible to say that this verse in dependent on the AT version of the Addition. We will come back to this later. The text then continues with the examination of the matter by the king. I have already discussed the verb ETCC^CO and concluded that there is no reason to claim a dependence of the LXX on the Addition. When describing the investigation of the king, the text of the the Addition, however, has an additional action; the two eunuchs agreed. The verb 6|joAoyEOnat only occurs here, in the LXX as well as in the AT (in 7.41 the AT has a compound verb, cxv0O(joXoy£O|jai). The verb is thus typical for Add. A. The king orders the eunuchs' execution. In ch. 2, the verb 'to hang' is used. This is a common verb for the LXX and AT. Addition A, however, does not mention the hanging, but has the men 'led away'. This expression is also found in AT 7.11, where Haman is led away to execution. Again, there is no reason to see a dependence of the LXX on Add. A. Finally, we have to check whether or not ch. 2 is dependent on Add. A when it comes to 'writing the memo about the events'. The LXX only has one sentence: 'Then the king ordered a memorandum to be deposited in the royal library in praise of the goodwill shown by Mordecai'. The verb TrpooTaoaco is a typical LXX verb (it is used in 1.15, 19; 2.23; 3.2, 12; Add. B.6; 3.14). The AT uses it only once, in the parallel to Add. B.6. In its first verb, ch. 2 is certainly not dependent on the Addition. The Addition adds several items—namely, that Mordecai wrote an account of them, that the king ordered Mordecai to serve in the courtyard, and that he rewarded him for these things. According to Kossmann, the LXX has combined the MT, where the king writes, and the AT, where the king writes and where something is written about Mordecai. However, I have read the plus of the LXX as compensation for omitting 'in the name of Mordecai',

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the element of the MT that has not been translated. That leaves me with a question: Why does the LXX not mention two writings, one of the king and one by Mordecai? Is it because the LXX has Mordecai write something in ch. 8 in the name of the king? Is it because the LXX mentions another writing by Mordecai in 9.20 and 23? Immediately after the king writes and after Mordecai writes, the Addition mentions that the king ordered Mordecai to serve in the courtyard. We have already discussed the verb GEparrEueiv and concluded that it was typical of LXX Esther. That the Addition uses the verb is to be expected, for it is the result of Mordecai's actions. In a sense, the Addition provides a reason for Mordecai's actions in the court—namely, that he was ordered to be there. Maybe the Addition is just confirming and explaining what Mordecai was already doing from the very beginning of Add. A? The king also rewards Mordecai. The verb 'to reward' occurs many times in both the LXX and the AT. It does appear more often in the LXX than in the AT. For example, the noun 'reward' occurs only in the LXX Add. A, and not in the AT. The Addition seems to be influenced by the LXX; however, that might be stretching things a little bit too far. What we can say, at least, is that ch. 2 is not dependent on Add. A. (3) Comparing Add. A in its LXX Form to its AT Form. Again, I will focus on the elements that are different in the two texts. Kossmann notes that the AT mentioned that Mordecai 'was in a good mood'. I would prefer the translation that Mordecai 'thought well (of the king)'. According to Kossmann, this explains why Mordecai told the king about the conspiracy. I admit that the AT provides a good reason for Mordecai's action. Whether this proves the AT to be more original is, however, questionable. Moreover, the same verb is found in Add. E.I, 2, in the LXX, as well as in the AT. In my opinion, it is difficult to decide, based on this argument, which text is the more original. The AT has the king write, and then something is written about Mordecai. As already indicated, the MT has only the king write something, whereas the LXX has both the king and Mordecai write something. Although we cannot explain why Add. A mentions two writings, we can explain the construction of the AT. The AT keeps the first part of Add. A. 15: 'and the king wrote about these things'. Then, it turns the next element upside down. Instead of saying that 'Mordecai wrote about these things', the AT states that 'something was written about Mordecai'. This does not necessarily mean that there were two writings; it only specifies that something

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was written about Mordecai. As the AT does not have the section at the end of ch. 2, it needs a reference to Mordecai here in Add. A in order to have some reference to Mordecai available when it comes to ch. 6. My guess is that the AT adapted the LXX and turned the second writing into a writing concerning Mordecai, which may or may not be the same as the writing of the king. I prefer to see a dependence of the AT on the LXX in this case. Finally (and connected with the former issue), according to Kossmann, AT Add. A. 15 is more original than LXX Add. A. 15, for the latter is dependent on LXX 9.20. The sentence 'and Mordecai wrote about these things' can indeed be found in LXX 9.20. Its contents, however, are very much different. In ch. 9, Mordecai writes about how he avoided the massacre, whereas the letter mentioned in Add. A deals with Mordecai's preventing the king's assassination. As I mentioned earlier, I am not sure why the LXX mentions Mordecai's writing about the assassination, but I do know that the letter of Mordecai is a piece characteristic of the AT. In 7.33-38, the letter of Mordecai is explicitly quoted. As already noted, this is a very different letter. It is a letter about Haman and his plans. This confirms my view that the AT did not want to have Mordecai writing at the beginning of the book, for the letter of Mordecai would appear at a later stage in the narrative. The AT at this point needs only a memo about Mordecai and not a memo from Mordecai. Again, the parallel between ch. 9 and Add. A in the LXX version does not turn the LXX Addition into a secondary piece, nor does it prove the originality of the AT. More strongly, the AT's avoidance of a letter from Mordecai in the beginning of the story makes room for the emphasis on the letter from Mordecai in ch. 7. So far, I have no reason to accept AT Add. A as the more original form of the Addition. On the contrary, at the end of this section, I would like to point to AT Add. A. 16b-17. Kossmann could not use these verses as they were too much influenced by the LXX. I fully agree with this. In 16b, Mordecai is commanded to serve in the courtyard. Both verbs are typical of the LXX. (4) Chapter 2 and Chapter 6. My analysis proves Kossmann wrong. The Addition is not the more original form of the conspiracy story. Should we therefore conclude that ch. 2 is the more original form? The problem remains: Which ch. 2? The MT or the LXX version? Do we accept the arguments, respectively, of Haelewyck, or of Fox, Tigay and Nickelsburg? Or should we agree with Clines, who argues that MT 2.21-23 is an expansion

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of MT 6 and that there was no such section in proto-Esther? In order to answer these questions, I will briefly answer the following two questions. My first question: Can MT ch. 2 sufficiently explain Add. A or does one need LXX ch. 2 to explain Add. A? Going through the list of differences that I have used for the rebuttal of Kossmann, the MT cannot explain the memory element as mentioned in the Addition, nor can it explain the serving in the courtyard. I even doubt whether the MT can sufficiently explain the anger element. As far as I can see, the MT could not have been developed into the text of Add. A. The LXX, however, could lead to the development of these elements; or at least, the LXX and the Addition look more related to one another than does the MT and Add. A. It seems clear that the LXX has created Add. A, or has incorporated and adapted an independent tradition into its story. The second question: Is MT ch. 2 an expansion of MT ch. 6? I do not think so. It is very characteristic of the MT to introduce a theme into the story that at first sight does not seem to make sense, or at least that seems out of place. Again and again, it turns out that the MT projects an element into the story that it will need later on. I consider ch. 2 a typical example of the author's brilliant capacity to slowly but efficiently develop the plot of the book of Esther. I conclude: MT 2.21-23 was translated into LXX 2.21-23. The translator added Add. A. 12-17. The AT reworked the LXX. The AT avoided 2.21 -23, for it looked like a doublet. The MT, Peshitta, Targumim and even Josephus witness to the text in ch. 2. The Vetus Latina is often considered a witness for the AT. However, the most important witness for the Vetus Latina, the Codex Monacensis, does have 2.21-23 and thus does not witness to a tradition without the text. The witnesses therefore confirm the internal evidence. 4. General Conclusion Having analyzed Add. A. 12-17 in this contribution, and Add. D and Add. E in other publications (De Troyer 1999, 2000a, 2000b, 2002), I have the following general view on the origin and relationship of the different texts of Esther. First, there was a short Hebrew text. Then, it was translated into Greek. The translator added Add. A. 12-17, (Add. B,) Add. E, and Add. D. I still have to do more research on Add. C, as well as the first part of Add. A and Add. F, the dream and its interpretation. However, it seems as if the LXX did already include Add. A. 12-17, Add. E, and Add. D, and most

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probably also Add. B, which is the counterpart of Add. E. This text was reworked into a new Greek story, the second Greek text of Esther. The development from MT to LXX, and then to AT is, in my opinion, a good example of how stories were reshaped in Judaism. Not only is the reshaping of Scripture typical for the Hebrew Bible, it is also characteristic of the Greek Bible. There is rewritten Hebrew Bible and there is also rewritten Greek Bible (De Troyer forthcoming).

THREE ESTHERS* Michael V. Fox

Different people see the same persons in different ways. This is true in both life and literature. This is also the case with literary figures. It is acutely so with Esther. Some people cannot stand her. One line of feminist reading disparages her for being a handmaiden of patriarchy: obedient, pliable, silver-tongued and manipulative, a woman who gets her way by placatory language and ingratiating formulas. Her behavior is said to undergird the assumptions of patriarchal ideology by showing that a woman should be obedient and submissive. Moreover, women's independence is repudiated through the example of Vashti, a repudiation Esther does not oppose (Fuchs 1982: 155-56).1 This is not far in spirit from some Christian commentators who condemn her for a failing in personal virtues, though a different set of virtues is in question. Lewis Paton, writing in 1908, says that 'Esther, for the chance of winning wealth and power, takes her place in the herd of maidens who become concubines of the King. She wins her victories not by skill or by character, but by her beauty' (Paton 1908: 96). Other commentators condemn Esther, along with the author and the other Jews in the book, for vindictiveness or impiety. Some consider these to be the quailties not just of Esther but of the entire Jewish people. M. Haller believes

* This essay, a revision of the Esther2000 public lecture, is based on (and in certain ways goes beyond) my Character and Ideology (Fox 199 la). It does not enter into discussion with the scholarly literature except for a few particularly relevant items. For survey and comment on Esther scholarship of the 1990s see the Afterword to the 2001 edition. I would call attention also to the valuable study by L. Day (1995), which is a detailed literary examination of the character of Esther in each of the three versions. 1. Similarly, Laffey (1988: 156) states: 'Rather than defend Vashti's decision and protest the injustice of her banishment, Esther uses Vashti's rejection for her own benefit'.

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that the book displays the 'bad, even repulsive, features of this national character—above all the unrestrained vindictiveness, which with true Oriental savagery allows its imagination to swim and revel in the blood of the opponent' (Haller 1925: 328-29). Other readers hold Esther in high esteem. For the ancient rabbis and medieval commentators, she was a paragon of Jewish values, including piety and courage, and not only of feminine virtue. Elizabeth Cady Stanton, a prominent nineteenth-century woman's rights advocate, admires Vashti for refusing to display her beauty at the king's call. But Stanton also appreciates Esther's strength: Vashti had exercised heroic courage in asserting womanly dignity and the inherent human right never recognized by kingship, to choose whether to please and to obey the king. Esther, so as to save her people from destructtion, risked her life... Women as queenly, as noble and as self-sacrificing as was Esther, as self-respecting and as brave as was Vashti, are hampered in their creative office by the unjust statutes of men.2

Sidnie White Crawford (White 1989) offers a more nuanced assessment. She emphasizes Esther's ability to adapt and maneuver in an environment that allows for no other way to achieve one's goals. Esther is the heroine of the story, and she is meant to serve as a paradigm for Jews in the diaspora living in a subordinate position in vast and impersonal empires. It is not just readers who see Esther so differently. Authors do as well, and consequently they have brought different versions of Esther into existence. An 'author' may be an editor, reworking older texts, and it may be a collective concept, embracing the various writers and redactors who shaped the text until it reached its present form. We have three such versions of Esther in texts from ancient times. As the Dead Sea Scrolls and the modern study of the ancient translations have shown us, around the turn of the era there were a variety of texts of the biblical books, some quite disparate. Some of these versions are earlier than the canonical text. The three ancient books of Esther are the canonical Masoretic Text (MT) in Hebrew, and two preserved in Greek translation, namely, the Alpha Text (AT) and the Septuagint (LXX). These three versions tell what is 2. Stanton and Chandler 1975: 92. Zaeske (2000: 215-16) shows how women authors and rhetors over the centuries actually used Esther as a model of practical rhetoric: 'Esther's is a pragmatic rhetoric aimed at gaining power through ingratiation despite and within a debilitating context of oppression'. The book of Esther is 'a pragmatic rhetoric of empowerment designed for and embraced by oppressed peoples throughout time'.

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basically the same story but in quite different ways. They are variations on a theme, that theme being the story of Esther. I want to compare them from a particular perspective, namely, the different ways they shape the character of Esther. 1. The Masoretic Text In the MT, Esther enters the story in the second chapter, against the background of the recent deposition of Vashti, who refused to put herself on display before the tipsy noblemen. The author seems to align himself with Vashti, for he clearly satirizes her opponents, the silly 'wise men' of the Persian Empire. Esther, in contrast, is docile and obedient. Esther has always been under the control of males, first owing obedience to her cousin Mordecai, her guardian (who, after all, stood in loco parentis), then to the eunuch Hegai, then to the king. When Xerxes wants a new queen, Esther 'is taken'—the passive voice dominates in this section—and herded into the harem along with the other beautiful virgins. Esther neither vies for the queenship nor resists it. Her will is of no interest. She—like everyone else in the empire—belongs to the king. After undergoing a twelve-month beauty regimen, she is taken to the king for a trial night. With no apparent effort (see Est. 2.15), Esther is chosen as queen. So far, Esther appears to be merely sweet and compliant. Surely she is suited to life in the mindless fluff of royal luxury, and for five years she continues thus. Nothing suggests that she could ever take her people's fate into her hands. Then everything changes. When Mordecai informs Esther of the murderous decree and asks her to go to the king and plead with him to spare her people, she demurs, out of fear for her life. Still, Mordecai persists. If she refuses, he says, someone or something else will save the Jews, but she and her family will perish. But, he says, 'Who knows if it was not for just a time like this that you reached royal station?' (Est. 4.14). Esther's life just might be more significant than she realizes. It might hold a meaning she had not envisioned. For that very reason she must be willing to risk it. At this moment, she undergoes a profound, almost inexplicable change, as if Mordecai had stirred up in her a latent sense of destiny. She now takes the initiative. In a foreshadowing of the role she is about to assume, she immediately commands Mordecai to assemble the Jews to fast for her (Est. 4.14-17). She has begun initiating plans of her own, and she is

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becoming a leader of her people. Then she declares, with quiet determination, 'I will go to the king unlawfully, and if I perish, I perish' (4.16). On the third day of fasting, she approaches the king, and he extends his scepter to spare her life. What she does next is not exactly what Mordecai had said to do. He had told her to beseech the king to spare her people. But that might not have worked. After all, Persian law, according to the fictional premises of the tale, is unalterable (Est. 1.19; 9.27). Moreover, Haman is the king's favorite minister, and the king may wish to protect him. Esther follows her own counsel and timing. Rather than blurting out her plea, she proceeds circuitously and bides her time with two banquets that put Haman off guard and build the king's expectancy. Commentators who condemn her circuity do not pause to think what would have happened if she had immediately made bold demands. Would the king have done away with his prime minister with no further ado? He himself was implicated in the scheme. Esther is more subtle than that. Her delays pique the king's curiosity and elicit from him a repeated promise to fulfill her wish, whatever it may be. She withholds information that could put the king on the defensive (by making him face his own culpability) and delays other information, namely, her own Jewishness and the identity of the offender, until the time is ripe. She soothes the king with deferential courtesies and courtly demurrals that play to his ego. Only when she has given full momentum to the king's unfocused anger does she identify the villain, 'a man hateful and hostile— this vile Haman'. Haman quakes in terror—'before the king and the queen' (7.6). Queen Esther is now a force to be reckoned with. After Haman is executed for attempting to rape Esther (he could not very well have been executed for a deed the king was implicated in), Xerxes bestows power upon Mordecai and Esther. He transfers the royal signet, and thus the viziership, from Haman to Mordecai. He also gives Esther Haman's estate, and she turns it over to Mordecai's stewardship. She now stands in the role of donor to Mordecai. This gives the Jews considerable economic power with which to pursue their defensive strategy. Still, the deadly decree stands. Esther and Mordecai must devise a way to counter the irrevocable decree. The Jews have been proscribed; anyone may kill them with impunity and seize their wealth. The solution is a counter decree to permit the Jews to defend themselves, and this they do with great success. By this device, the author allows the Jews to save themselves by standing up for their own lives, rather than being delivered by a royal protector.

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After the victory, there is an exchange of letters, in which the Jewish people democratically confirm Mordecai's suggestion of establishing an annual festival. Two letters (Est. 9.20-25, 29-31) are issued to 'confirm' this decision. In the MT, both letters are ascribed to Mordecai and Esther jointly (9.29,31). But the text is awkward, and an emended text has Esther alone as the author of the second epistle.3 Finally, 'the declaration of Esther confirmed these matters concerning Purim, and it was written in a document' (9.32). The docile young beauty has risen to truly royal stature, a queen of the Jewish people as well as of the Persian empire. The book ends with a note on Mordecai's prominence and service to the crown (10.1-3), thereby framing Esther's story in Mordecai's. Of the book's two heroes, it is Esther with whom the reader most naturally identifies. Mordecai is an unblinking paragon of virtue—and as such, more distant and less interesting. Esther shows how an ordinary person, one with little initial promise, can rise to a crisis and grow to meet its demands. As such she is the more distinctive and interesting, the more human character. Through the person of Esther, the author links the issue of national salvation to individual character. From unpromising beginnings, she becomes an independent, dignified, powerful woman. By putting her life on the line for her people, she earns a position of leadership, in partnership with Mordecai.

3. By emendation the text reads: 'And Queen Esther, daughter of Abihayil, conveyed in writing all the authority necessary to confirm this Purim epistle. And letters were sent to all the Jews in the 127 provinces of Xerxes' kingdom—words of greeting and faithfulness—to confirm the observance of these days of Purim in their set times, just as Mordecai the Jew had confirmed upon them, in the way that they confirm upon themselves and their descendants matters of fasting and the accompanying laments (9.29-31 [all translations are mine]). This requires the following emendations: Deleting 'and Mordecai the Jew' from v. 29; changing the verb 'he sent' in v. 30a to 'there were sent' (vocalizing as niphal); omitting 'second' from the end of v. 29; and removing 'and Queen Esther' from v. 3la. These emendations are conjectural. The justification for them is that they produce a much clearer text: Esther writes a letter to confirm by her authority the validity of Mordecai's epistle. The present text is possible but contorted. It has both leaders writing both letters, with the second letter written to confirm itself and the first one. The errors presupposed by the emendation could have been introduced by a scribe who assumed that both letters were written by both leaders. For details and discussion, see Fox 1991a: 124-25, 286.

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The book is exploring and affirming the potential of human character to rise to the needs of the hour by whatever means and devices the situation demands. In Esther, it is not miracles, but inner resources—intellectual as well as spiritual—that one must call upon in crisis, and every Jew must be ready to respond to the call. Despite their objective weakness in the gentile world, when national crisis strikes, a Jew can and must find the courage and ingenuity to rise to the challenge, and yet must do so without the 'masculine' devices of king and army. Esther shows that this is possible. This is not exactly a feminist message, nor is it particularly representative of a female voice. By observing the constraints upon Esther, yet making her the deliverer of the people, the author suggests that even a woman, even a woman in the great king's harem, holds this readiness for the call. 2. The Alpha Text'3' The Alpha Text (AT) is a Greek version that diverges considerably from the LXX. The AT is preserved only in five manuscripts dating to the tenth to the thirteenth centuries, one of which is a mixed text.5 Developing, with some modifications, a thesis of Carey Moore (1967: 351-58; 1971: LXH-LXIH) and David Clines (1984: 71-92), I have argued that the AT translates a Hebrew text that is earlier than the MT (Fox 1991b: 10-95). Some time after it was translated into Greek, a redactor added the six major Septuagintal Additions (A-F) and a few more Septuagintal passages. I will be discussing the AT before the passages were borrowed (the 'protoAT'). My observations on character portrayal do not depend on my theories about the dating and composition of the book, except insofar as I exclude passages that were secondarily borrowed from the LXX.6 The story line in the original AT proceeds in much the same way as in the MT until Haman arranges for the destruction of the Jews. When Mordecai learns what has happened, he contacts Esther and, in a brief exchange, convinces her to approach the king and 'charm him on behalf of 4. Numeration of the AT follows the system in the Cambridge LXX. Hanhart's (1983) Gottingen edition assimilates the chapter numbers to the MT. Clines includes a translation of the AT (1984b: 216-47). 5. Manuscripts 19,93,108,319 and 392 (the last one mixes the LXX and the AT). See Hanhart 1983: 15-16. 6. I argue that the following passages are secondary to the AT—the Additions: 1.1-18 (A); 4.14-18(8); 5.12b-29(C); 6.1-12 (D); 8.22-32 (E), 53-59 (F). Others: 3.la, 5b-8; 4.2, 9b-ll-10a (correct order); 5.4b-5,9b-10; 6.13-18,21ab; 7.1; 8.18-29,33-38.

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me and the people' (AT 5.4a). He continues, 'Therefore, after calling upon God, speak on our behalf to the king and deliver us from death' (vv. 5-6). When she hesitates, he tells her that if she fails to help her people, 'God will be a help and salvation for them, but you and your father's house will perish; and who knows if it was not for this very moment that you came to royal station' (vv. 9-10). The mention of God, rather than 'another source', makes the promise more definite and may help steel Esther's resolve. She determines to do her duty and declares a public fast (AT ch. 5). Esther invites the king and Haman to one banquet, then another. At the second banquet, Esther is tremulous and in fear of the king. But God gives her courage, it says, and she pleads for her people and identifies Haman as the villain. At the point when the MT reports the transfer of Haman's power and wealth to Mordecai and Esther (Est. 8.3), the AT resolves the crisis quite differently: And the king summoned Mordecai, and he bestowed on him all that was Haman's. And he said to him, 'What do you want? 1 shall do it for you.' And Mordecai said, 'That you annul the letter of Haman'. And the king put into his hands the affairs of the kingdom. (AT 8.15-17)

The AT has Haman's wealth transmitted to Mordecai, the expected recipient. Since the AT does not premise that Persian laws could never be changed, the king can simply annul his decree. Mordecai's request and the king's graciousness saves them, and no counter decree or battles are necessary. This means that, unlike in the MT, the Jews do not deliver themselves: they do not 'stand up for their lives' (Est. 9.16). They are passive spectators to the working-out of their fate. It is all done for them, above all by Mordecai. After Haman is executed, Esther says to the king: 'Allow me to punish my enemies by slaughter'... And she smote the enemies in great numbers. And in Susa the king agreed with the queen to slaughter men, and he said, 'Behold I give them to you to hang'. And it was so. (AT 8.19a, 20-21)

The Jews' enemies are punished not in battle but after the crisis is over, presumably by royal troops at Esther's request. This act makes Esther more vindictive, for the Jews are no longer in peril. The Jews are not brought into the picture until Mordecai issues a proclamation informing everybody of what had happened and telling the Jews to celebrate in their towns. Then he explains why:

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Haman sent you letters saying thus: 'Make haste swiftly to send the disobedient Jewish people to destruction for me'. But I Mordecai inform you that the one who did these things has been hanged before the gates of Susa and his household has been executed, for he sought to kill us on the thirteenth day of the month, which is Adar. (AT 8.33-38)

This letter is entirely Mordecai's work. Esther's role is largely finished once she has made her plea for help. By having the new holiday ordained from above, the AT makes the roles of Esther and the Jewish people recede behind Mordecai's. In the MT, in contrast, the new holiday of Purim is established in a complex legal dialectic of proposal and confirmation involving the Jews and their two leaders. The AT's Esther is closer to the figure that many readers, especially feminists, believe exists in the MT. She is a pliant tool of Mordecai who is sent to the king to charm him. She pleads with him and gets her way. She is not particularly clever. She is fearful when facing the enemy (AT 8.2), whereas in the MT her fear is inspired by a formidable law and the king himself. And she almost flinches at the crucial moment of revelation (AT 6.6). She does not make plans, nor does she participate in the writing of the epistle to the Jews. Still, the AT's Esther is not inert. She does take risks and do her duty, but her character does not rise far from where it began, when she won the king's favor by being 'charming'. As soon as Mordecai is called in, Esther disappears, except to ask the king to punish her enemies. The contrast between the AT and the MT shows that Esther's features in the MT are not accidental: in the latter she is deliberately rewritten and allowed to grow into a bold, independent leader. 3. The Septuagint The Greek translation of Esther goes back to the first century BCE and was made by Jews for the Greek-speaking diaspora, particularly in Alexandria. It subsequently became the sacred text of early Christianity and is still the canonical text of the Eastern Orthodox Church. The translated part of Esther is a free rendering of the Hebrew, but reasonably faithful to its sense. At various stages, however, six major supplements were inserted to fill in what were perceived to be gaps in the older story; these are known as Additions A-F. The two most important for the portrayal of Esther are Additions C and D.

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Addition C, coming just before Esther's entry to the throne room, comprises two prayers. First is Mordecai's, in which he declares to God that he was not motivated by vanity or arrogance when he refused to bow to Haman, and he entreats God to save Israel. Then comes Esther's prayer, in which she assures God that she despises the gentile's bed and her own crown and further attests that she refrains from the heathens' food and wine. She asks God to hearken to her prayer and protect her from her fears and she prays for salvation. These prayers deal with two aspects of Mordecai and Esther's behavior whose wisdom and propriety might be doubted, and they imbue the heroes, and the book, with the expected piety. This addition addresses problems that Jewish interpreters saw in the Ml: Esther's dietary practices and her marriage to the gentile king. Addition D embellishes the circumstances of Esther's entry to the throne room. Esther puts on splendid attire and prays again. Then, shaky with anxiety, leaning on one maidservant while another holds her train, she approaches the dread king. When the king looks up, she faints. But God—and, undoubtedly, Esther's feminine frailty—puts the king in a tender mood. He takes pity on her and raises her up in his arms, and he tries to put her at ease. The prohibition against approaching the king unbidden, he reassures her, does not apply to royalty. Esther responds with a gush of flattery. Then, apparently drained by the agitation, she faints again, and the anxious king, with all his courtiers, tries to comfort her. The effect of this expansion is, first of all, to change Esther's character. The MT'S Esther is a woman who resolves to do her duty whatever the cost, enters the throne room and quietly awaits the king's decision. The LXX's Addition D makes her into a fainthearted, delicate, obsequious lady who faints like a stereotypical Victorian damsel or the heroine of a Gothic novel.7 She swoons at the mere sight of her husband's dreadful radiance; then, even after he has reassured her, she passes out again. At the same time, Addition D plays up the king's leonine aura and his gracious sensitivity, in line with his image in Additions B and E, which are proclamations in which the king justifies his first decree and excuses the second. The episode in Addition D actually violates the logic of the narrative, because if the prohibition against approaching the king did not apply to Esther, why is the king at first so angry, and why did she or Mordecai not know the rule? Her worry about the prohibition against approaching the

7.

See Wills 1995: 93-131, who deals with the MT and the LXX Esther.

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king unbidden, which she so resolutely overcomes in Chapter 4, turns out to have been mistaken and pointless. What, then, was the motive for this Addition? I think that the author of Addition D wanted to make Esther more attractive to a late Hellenistic audience. For one thing, she is made to conform to an ideal favored in the popular romantic and melodramatic novels of the late Hellenistic period. The MT Esther too has some features of the Hellenistic novel, including an interest in the king's love life (such as it is), blood and gore, and a delight in lush depictions of royal extravagance. The Additions introduce a number of elements known from the Hellenistic romances, including explicit and extensive explorations of thoughts and feelings, the heroine's piety, female frailty, overwhelming emotions and fainting—by males as well as females. The atmosphere of Addition D is strongly redolent of scenes from Hellenistic novels such as Cheriton? Second, the Esther of the MT may have seemed a bit too forward and self-assured to the Jewish reader of the Alexandrian diaspora who had absorbed Hellenistic attitudes. There seems to have been a progressive deterioration in the status of women in Hellenistic culture (see, inter alia, Frymer-Kensky 1992: 203-22). In such a setting, for a young lady to approach the Great King on her own initiative was not merely dangerous, it was improper. So Esther was equipped with demonstrative humility and timidity to offset any implication of brashness or self-assertion in her actions. Whereas the MT Esther displays the courtly respectfulness of a proper subject, the LXX Esther reassures the king by virtually losing control of herself. She removes any suggestion of threat to his masculine control. She gives him the confidence to respond with gracious condescension. This is a deliberate use of feminine frailty, to be distinguished from the obligatory courtly submissiveness and the tactical self-effacement that the MT Esther, like everyone else in the Persian court, must employ. When the author of the MT Esther describes female subservience, the purpose is to highlight the constraints within which Esther must operate and the burden of social expectations that she must overcome as she steps into the breach. The author is not protesting against these constraints, but neither does he suggest that they are inherently right. The LXX seems to want her to observe these constraints as a matter of propriety. The Esther 8. See Fox 1991a: 145. Wills (1995) offers an extended and nuanced comparative study of the Hellenistic Jewish novella with the Greek novel of the late Hellenic world (200 BCE to 100 CE). For a survey of the Hellenistic romance see Hagg 1983.

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of the LXX, particularly as her character emerges in Additions C and D, is more pious and less independent than the Esther of the MT. The LXX Esther's character fits in well with the view of history revealed in Addition A, which recounts Mordecai's dream, a symbolic vision of the events to follow, and Addition F, which decodes the dream in terms of the events that ensued. These Additions express a deterministic worldview, in which history is only a drama staged in advance, a testing ground for human faith. Human agency and initiative recede in favor of piety and divine governance. This world picture—expressed also in Daniel—suggests an age where Jews feel themselves helpless before the juggernauts of hostile powers. 4. The Real Esther? Where can we find the real Esther? Nowhere, if we are thinking of a fleshand-blood woman who lived 2500 years ago in Persia. Such a person would be beyond our reach, and in any case it is unlikely that there ever was one. The book shows every sign of being a fiction, though the author probably wished us to understand the book as recording historical events (Fox 199 la: 131-40). In literary terms, however, there are many 'real' Esthers. Every time an author rewrites the story, a real Esther is created. Three were created in the versions I have surveyed. Others have been created by authors and playwrights of subsequent eras who imported this ancient figure into their stories and gave her a new life. Different readers can re-envision Esther in different, even contrary ways. This does not mean that every perception is equally valid, but only that they are feasible readings. This is what we do when evaluating people in real life. It is significant, then, that Esther has a similar effect. Esther, especially the MT Esther we know best, comes out of the book and lives a life of her own. She now walks among us. There is something unforgettable about the amiable and malleable young woman who rises to bear her people's fate on her shoulders, delivering them from destruction and helping ordain their customs. Authors, and readers too, will always be giving us new visions, and new versions, of a woman who can do such a thing.

ESTHER AND JUDITH: CONTRASTS IN CHARACTER Sidnie White Crawford

The books of Esther and Judith are often paired with one another. For example, in the arrangement of the books of the Septuagint the book of Judith follows Esther. In the comments of Church Fathers such as Clement of Rome, Clement of Alexandria, Athanasius of Alexandria and Augustine, as well as in modern commentaries, the books of Esther and Judith are often grouped together, compared and contrasted. This pairing occurs even in the world of art, for example in the work of the Renaissance painter Artemesia Gentileschi, who uses both women as subjects. The reason behind this pairing is clear: both are books which take their name from their female heroine, and in both books it is the Jewish heroine who saves her people from imminent destruction at the hands of the Gentiles by her courage and resourcefulness. The book of Esther is part of the canon of the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament, in which it is part of the Writings or Ketubim. It tells the story of a young Jewish orphan named Esther and her cousin and guardian Mordecai, who are residents of the Persian capital of Susa. The Persian king Ahasuerus is searching for a new queen, having deposed his first wife Vashti for disobedience. Esther enters the king's harem, wins his favor, and is crowned queen. Meanwhile her cousin Mordecai, a royal courtier, gets into a quarrel with Haman, the king's second-in-command, refusing to bow or do obeisance to Haman. Haman determines to get revenge on Mordecai by arranging the slaughter of all the Jews in the Persian Empire. Mordecai goes to Esther to enlist her help in this crisis. Esther, through a series of skillful political maneuvers, brings about Haman's downfall, saves the Jews, and installs Mordecai as the king's chief counselor. The events narrated in the book of Esther are now celebrated in the Jewish holiday of Purim. The book of Judith is found in the Apocrypha, a group of books contained in the Septuagint but not in the Hebrew Bible. These books are part

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of the canon in the Orthodox Church(es), and are considered 'deuterocanonical' by the Roman Catholic Church. In the book of Judith, the nations of the Levant, or the eastern Mediterranean coast, are being subdued by Holofernes, a general in the army of King Nebuchadnezzar. The Jews of Bethulia, a small town on the road to Jerusalem, resist, but as their water supply runs low their resolve crumbles. At this point Judith, a beautiful, wealthy widow, promises to save Bethulia from Holofernes. She leaves Bethulia accompanied only by her maid, enters the enemy camp and by seduction and flattery wins the confidence of Holofernes. One night in his tent, after Holofernes has passed out drunk, Judith takes his sword, cuts off his head and escapes in triumph to Bethulia. The exultant Bethulians decimate the panicky enemy forces. Jerusalem is saved, and Judith is celebrated as a great hero. As can already be seen in the plot summary, an extensive list of similarities can be drawn up for the two books, which demonstrates that the books of Esther and Judith are closely related on several levels. For the purposes of my comparison I am referring primarily to the version of Esther found in the Hebrew Masoretic Text, which is the text translated in most English Bibles. I will specify when I am referring to the Septuagint (LXX) or to the Alpha Text (AT) editions of Esther. On the literary level, both books are examples of Jewish novellas of the post-exilic period, and both are historicized fiction. Esther purports to be set in the Persian capital of Susa during the reign of Xerxes (486^65 BCE). Although the character and events portrayed in the book receive no outside corroboration and in fact contradict what we know of the reign of the historical Xerxes (e.g. his queen was one Amestris throughout his reign), the author's subterfuge is so successful that debates about the historicity of Esther continue to this day.1 The fictional nature of Judith is much more apparent, since the book begins with a whopping historical blunder, identifying Nebuchadnezzar as the king of the Assyrians ruling from Nineveh (Jdt. 1.1). Nebuchadnezzar was in fact the Babylonian emperor who caused the destruction of Jerusalem in 587 BCE, 25 years after the downfall of the Assyrian Empire and its capital Nineveh in 612 BCE.

Both books rely heavily on humor and irony to convey their message. Two brief examples will suffice. In Est. 6.1-11, Haman is humiliated as a

1. See Laniak 1998: 3 n. 5, who states, 'I do not count myself among those who reject the book of Esther as a source of history'.

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result of his own inflated ego. The king has discovered in the royal archives that Mordecai had saved the king's life but has not yet been rewarded. Discovering Haman in the court, Ahasuerus asks him, 'What shall be done for the man whom the king wishes to honor?' Haman asks himself, 'Whom would the king wish to honor more than me?' The ironical answer is, of course, his enemy Mordecai. In the ensuing scene Haman is forced to bestow upon Mordecai the very honor he dreamed of for himself: Mordecai is arrayed in the king's robes and mounted on the king's horse, while Haman leads him through Susa proclaiming, 'Thus shall it be done for the man whom the king wishes to honor'! The reader is meant to chuckle at this scene; the rabbis made it even more humiliating by adding the detail that Haman's own daughter empties a chamber pot over her father's head as he passes by (b. Meg. 16a). The author of Judith likewise freely employs irony. Judith, being wined and dined in Holofernes' tent as a prelude to seduction, makes a deeply ironic comment, 'I will gladly drink, my lord, because today is the greatest day in my whole life' (Jdt. 12.18). Holofernes assumes that she is referring to the prospect of sexual intercourse with him; the reader knows that she is actually referring to his imminent demise at her own hands. The structure of the two books is also similar. Both books contain relatively lengthy introductory episodes that are crucial to the main conflict of the plot; in Esther the deposition of Vashti in ch. 1 paves the way for Esther to become queen, while the first seven chapters of Judith narrate the wars of Nebuchadnezzar and Holofernes' siege of Bethulia. Both books use a chiastic form in which the main conflict is resolved in a series of reversals. The main reversal, or denouement of the plot occurs through the action of the heroine, when Esther accuses Haman before the king (Est. 7.6) and when Judith beheads Holofernes (Jdt. 13.6-9). Many parallels can be drawn also on the level of character. Esther is described as beautiful efface and figure (Est. 2.7), as is Judith (Jdt. 8.7). Esther is an orphan, Judith a widow; both are protected groups in Jewish society, but they are also marginalized members of that society. This marginalized status, along with their already secondary status as women in a patriarchal society, serves to make them role models for the Jewish community under alien domination, although with very different results. Esther is the epitome of the cooperative courtier; she achieves her goals by working within the system, not fighting it (White 1989). Judith, on the contrary, is a model for successful Jewish resistance to foreign rule.

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The sexuality of both characters is prominent. Esther wins the king's favor in what Michael Fox has characterized as a 'sex contest' (Fox 199 la: 28). Judith murders Holofernes at a banquet that is supposed to culminate in his sexual conquest of her (Jdt. 12.10-20). Both women recognize the value of their sexual appeal, using clothing and appearance as weapons: Esther puts on her royal robes for her unsummoned appearance before the king (Est. 5.1), while Judith beautifies and adorns herself with all the apparel and jewelry given to her by her dead husband (Jdt. 10.3-4). She 'astounds' all who see her with her beauty. In the LXX edition of Esther, her act of adornment is even more emphasized (Add. D.I-5). Esther is 'radiant with perfect beauty'. These heroines do not rely only on their beauty, however. Both use speech and rhetorical skills in order to achieve their goals. Esther's speeches to Ahasuerus are masterpieces of a courtier's skill, while Judith uses deceptive speech as a means to lull Holofernes into a false sense of security. In fact, Judith specifically prays for her 'deceitful words' to be successful in defeating the enemy (Jdt. 9.10,13). LXX Esther also petitions God for 'eloquent speech' before she appears before the king (Add. C. 13). Esther and Judith thus resemble other 'wise women' in the biblical tradition, who use speech as a means to accomplish their goals with male antagonists, as does the 'wise woman of Tekoa' in 2 Sam. 14.4-17. Other characters in the two books can also be paralleled. The male Gentile characters, Ahasuerus and Haman in Esther, Nebuchadnezzar and Holofernes in Judith, share several characteristics. Ahasuerus and Nebuchadnezzar are both foreign kings who dominate the Jewish community. Nebuchadnezzar, however, is a shadowy but malign figure, while the more prominent Ahasuerus, albeit mercurial and thus dangerous, proves ultimately benign. In fact, Ahasuerus has aspects of the buffoon in his character. Nebuchadnezzar and Haman, however, are both implacable enemies of the Jews, and in both cases a biblical basis for their hostility can be traced. Haman, as a descendant of Agag, king of the Amalekites, is the hereditary enemy of the house of Saul, Mordecai's ancestor (see 1 Sam. 15.1-33). Nebuchadnezzar is the historical king of Babylon who destroyed Jerusalem and its temple in 587 BCE. The Nebuchadnezzar in Judith, through Holofernes, shows the same enmity toward the rebellious Jews of Bethulia. On the simple level of character, Haman and Holofernes possess overweening pride and display a tendency to overreact to provocation (as does Ahasuerus). These characteristics are demonstrated in Haman by his boasting to his friends and family in Est. 5.9-14; he is proud of his posi-

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tion, but typically adds, 'Yet all this does me no good so long as I see the Jew Mordecai sitting at the king's gate'. Holofernes assumes that the defeat of the Bethulians is assured by his military prowess, but nevertheless flies into a rage when Achior attempts to warn him that they are defended by God (Jdt. 6.2-9). In the end, Haman and Holofernes are defeated and publicly shamed by the actions of the two women, Esther and Judith. This humiliation at the hands of women subverts the norms of their respective societies, both of which are male-dominated and patriarchal. The women, in addition to being women and therefore of secondary status in society, are also representative of the Jews. Note that Judith's very name means 'Jewess'! The Jews in the post-exilic period were dominated by foreign powers and thus politically in the cultural position of women; the Gentile male's defeat by the Jewish woman thus resonated along political as well as gender fault lines. The details of the plot and the roles of the minor characters also present numerous parallels. As Andre LaCocque points out, 'the sequence [of the two stories] is the same: life threat, deliverance, vengeance, triumph, institution of a commemorative festival' (LaCocque 1990: 71). The similarities are even more marked than that. The book of Esther opens with Queen Vashti's act of rebellion against the king, which sets in motion the plot of the story; likewise Judith opens with the rebellion of King Arphaxad. From a broad focus at the beginning of the stories the focus narrows to the Jewish protagonists. In Esther the initial episodes, the rebellion of Vashti and the gathering of the maidens into the king's harem, encompass the entire Persian empire, while the later episodes concentrate on Esther, Mordecai and the fate of the Jews. In the case of Judith the opening chapters involve the rebellion of numerous nations against Nebuchadnezzar, while the final chapters revolve around Judith and the Jews of Bethulia. At their introductions, both Esther and Judith lead secluded lives: Esther in the royal harem and Judith in her tent on the roof of her dead husband's house. Both of them leave the relative security of their quarters to confront danger on behalf of the Jews. They perform beautification rituals before leaving security and confronting danger, and both achieve their ends at dinner parties. Esther gives two dinner parties for Ahasuerus and Haman, while Judith attends a dinner party given by Holofernes. The various eunuchs and maids who surround Esther and Judith play crucial roles in the furtherance of the plots, and the women (and also Holofernes, in the case of his eunuch Bagoas) rely on their loyalty. In most paintings of Judith, in fact, her maid is almost as prominent as Judith herself.

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The minor characters in the books often play similar roles. Zeresh, the wife of Haman, warns him of his ultimate downfall at the hands of Mordecai the Jew (Est. 6.13). Achior the Ammonite warns Holofernes that the Jews cannot be defeated if they remain loyal to God (Jdt. 5.20). Both warnings prove correct; because of the actions of Esther and Judith, Haman and Holofernes, the enemies of the Jews, end up dead, as well as 75,000 enemies of the Jews in Esther and the Assyrian army in Judith. The Jewish triumph causes the conversion of Achior in Judith and at least the self-identification of many Gentiles with the Jews in Esther.2 The Jews at the end of both books engage in extensive rejoicing, in which Esther and Judith play leading roles. In neither book is there overt divine intervention; both stories rely on the political acumen and bravery of their respective heroines. It is human action that saves the Jews of Persia and of Bethulia.3 All of these similarities are striking; however, there are some important differences. First, there are no equivalents to the characters of Vashti and Mordecai in the story of Judith. There is no other female protagonist who sets the stage for Judith; Judith is unique. Vashti, on the other hand, serves as a foil for Esther; the contrast between Vashti's disobedience and Esther's obedience proves to be very important in the portrayal of the character of Esther. Likewise, Mordecai is a unique character. The minor character Uzziah in Judith cannot be compared to Mordecai; Mordecai is a major figure in Esther. As Esther's guardian he at first controls her actions ('for Esther obeyed Mordecai just as when she was brought up by him', Est. 2.20). He discovers the plot of the eunuchs against Ahasuerus (2.21-23); his later reward for that deed will cause Haman's first humiliation (6.10-11). It is his refusal of obeisance to Haman that results in the danger to the Jews of Persia; the Jews of Bethulia are in danger because of their refusal to capitulate in a war. Mordecai galvanizes Esther into action against Haman; Judith needs no urging from anyone. Finally, at the end of the book of Esther Mordecai has gained in stature and power, becoming the king's second-in-command; there is no equivalent to this in the book of Judith.

2. The question of whether the word D'HilTO in Est. 8.17 refers to actual conversion is unresolved (Levenson 1997: 117), although LXX Esther understands it to mean conversion through circumcision. 3. This is not so in LXX Esther, where God intervenes to make the king sleepless (LXX Est. 6.1) and causes the king to accept Esther when she appears unsummoned before him in the throne room (Add. D.8).

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Two other differences also bear mentioning. The book of Esther is set in Persia, in the diaspora, and thus the concerns and the interests of all the characters reside in the diaspora. They display no interest in the biblical land of Israel or its institutions; the exile from Judah gets only a passing reference in Mordecai's genealogy (Est. 2.6). The Jewish characters' lives are in Persia and they have every intention of remaining there. Gentile rule is not a problem for the author of Esther as long as it is benevolent. Judith, however, is set in Israel (albeit in a fictional location), and displays a great interest in and concern for Jerusalem, the temple and its institutions. In fact, the triumphant Jews of Bethulia travel to Jerusalem and remain there for three months, offering sacrifices and feasting. The author of Judith envisions a Jewish community governed by a high priest from the temple in Jerusalem. For the author of Judith, unlike the author of Esther, Gentile rule is never benevolent and must be opposed. Thus the geographical and political stances of the two stories are very different. This is the result of the different dates of the books. Esther, written in the eastern diaspora in the late fourth or early third centuries BCE (Crawford 1999: 856), reflects the relatively benign rule of the Persians over their subject peoples. Foreigners could and did rise to prominence in the Persian court; witness Nehemiah, cupbearer to Artaxerxes I (Neh. 1.11). Judith, however, was written around or after 150 BCE (Wills 1999: 1076-79), the time of the Maccabean revolt against the oppression of the Greek Seleucid emperors. For the author of Judith, foreign rulers are the enemy. The establishing of the festival of Purim in the book of Esther also constitutes a major difference between the two books. The final form of the Hebrew edition of Esther is what has been called a 'festival legend'. The book's raison d'etre is the establishment of the festival of Purim. As it is stated in Est. 9.28, 'These days should be remembered and kept throughout every generation, in every family, province and city; and these days of Purim should never fall into disuse among the Jews, nor should the commemoration of these days cease among their descendants'. In fact, Purim, since it was not a festival established by Moses in the Torah, did have trouble winning acceptance among all the Jews. However, its popularity proved too strong in the end for it to be abolished. So the story of Esther in many ways now rides on the coattails of the festival of Purim, rather than vice versa. The book of Judith does not seek to establish a permanent festival, although the story of Judith, because of its connection with the Maccabean revolt, was later associated with the festival of Hanukkah (another festival not established by Moses).

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Most striking is the difference in the role that religion and piety play in the two stories. The lack of religious piety in the Hebrew version of Esther is notorious. God is not mentioned by name at all. Neither Esther nor Mordecai display any concern for any of the laws of Judaism, even though one of Hainan's calumnies against the Jews is that they have a law different from every other people (Est. 3.8). Esther becomes the sexual partner and then the wife of a Gentile; she lives in his palace and eats his food with no recognition of the laws of kashrut; in fact, since Ahasuerus and his court, including Haman, have no idea that she is a Jew, she must be quite assimilated. There are no prayers, sacrifices or other acts of conventional religious piety; Mordecai does don ritual mourning garb when he hears Hainan's decree (4.1), and Esther orders all the Jews of Susa to fast for three days before she appears unsummoned before the king (4.15). However, the reason for the fast is unclear, and the purpose (to capture God's attention?) is unspecified. I have argued elsewhere that there is an implied theology in Hebrew Esther which assumes a belief in God and God's action in history, but the fact remains that this is only implied, not directly stated (Crawford 1999: 866-70). Jewish identity in Esther is ethnic, and Jews can successfully hide that identity; Esther does not reveal 'her kindred or her people' (that is, her ethnic origin—Est. 2.20), while Mordecai must tell the other courtiers in the course of his quarrel with Haman that he is Jewish (Est. 3.4). The result is an extremely limited definition of what it means to be a Jew, a definition peculiar to the Hebrew edition of Esther. The book of Judith, on the other hand, wears its piety openly. When Judith the character is introduced, the reader learns that 'no one.. .spoke ill of her, so devoutly did she fear God' (Jdt. 8.8). She fasts, prays and offers sound theology to the leaders of Bethulia (8.11-27). Before Judith puts her plan in motion, she prays in sackcloth and ashes to God; the text carefully reports that she does this just as the evening incense offering was being made in the Temple (9.1). In her prayer she quotes biblical texts and petitions God directly for help in his capacity as savior and protector of Israel (9.2-14). When she ventures into the enemy camp, she continues her prayer life, as well as refusing all food from the Gentile Holofernes and undertaking a nightly purification ritual (12.1-2, 7-8). Judith never has sexual intercourse with a Gentile, or anyone else for that matter, choosing to remain a widow for the rest of her life. Finally, at the end of the book Judith leads a triumphant procession of singing and dancing women,

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echoing such biblical heroines as Miriam and Deborah; when the Bethulians arrive in Jerusalem she dedicates all the spoil of Holofernes to the temple (16.19). The other Jewish characters in the book are also pious: the Israelites pray and fast at the approach of Holofernes, they are merciful to Achior, and at the end of the book they purify themselves and offer sacrifice. Thus the book of Judith remedies all the religious deficiencies of Hebrew Esther: God is central to the story, the Law is observed, the purpose of ritual observance (prayer, fasting, sacrifice) is understood and emphasized, and the heroine is not defiled by sexual relations with a Gentile. Of course, the same process is going on in the Additions to Esther in the LXX: God becomes a central character, both Esther and Mordecai pray (Add. C) and Esther claims to observe the dietary laws (Add. C). LXX Esther, however, cannot gloss over the fact that Esther is the sexual partner of the Gentile Ahasuerus; the best it can do is have her declare that she 'abhors the bed of the uncircumcised' (Add. C.I 5). Given the long list of similarities between the books of Esther and Judith at the literary level, in character and in plot, I believe that one of the models for the author of Judith was the story of Esther; he created a story in many ways parallel to Esther, but made two major changes: he set the story in Israel and made the heroine a model of religious piety.4 These changes make Judith a more acceptable heroine for ancient Jewish society. However, both books have generated a lot of controversy in the past, and continue to create a lot of controversy today. Why is this? First of all, both books had difficulty gaining acceptance into the canons of the Jewish and Christian Scriptures, which were formed in the early centuries of the Common Era. The Hebrew form of Esther was finally accepted into the Jewish (and hence the Protestant) canon, while one of the Greek versions of Esther became part of the LXX, the canon of the Orthodox Church(es). The Roman Catholic canon contains the Hebrew book of Esther in its Old Testament form, but takes the Additions found in the LXX and places them at the end of Hebrew Esther. The canonical history of Esther is thus quite complicated. Explanations for Esther's ultimate acceptance into the Jewish canon usually boil down to statements about the popularity of Purim and the appeal of the story to a wide audience. These considerations seemed to be enough to overcome objections to Esther raised in rabbinic circles in

4. I have argued elsewhere that another model for the author of Judith is the story of Jael and Deborah in Judg. 4-5 (White 1992).

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the first four centuries CE, objections that included the secular nature of the book and the non-Mosaic character of the festival of Purim. Esther, although accepted into the Christian canon, continues almost until the present time to be denigrated by Christian commentators for its secular nature, the sexual activities of its heroine and its supposedly anti-Gentile bias.5 The book of Judith's canonical history is also complicated, even though it emphasizes piety and does not insist upon the permanent establishment of its festival. Judith is not part of the Jewish (or Protestant) canon. It is part of the LXX, the canon of the Orthodox Church(es). The Roman Catholic Church places Judith in the Apocrypha, which has 'deuterocanonical' status. So Judith gained canonical status in some Christian circles, but not in all Christian circles, and not in Judaism. There are many reasons why the book of Judith was not accepted into the Jewish canon. Although most scholars think that Judith was written in Hebrew and then translated into Greek, by the time the Jewish canon was being formed the Hebrew original may no longer have existed. Only Hebrew or Aramaic books became part of the Jewish canon; hence Greek Judith was excluded. Also, no books written later than the Persian period (538-332 BCE) were included in the Jewish canon; Judith, written in the second century BCE, fits this category.6 There was no such rule for the LXX. There are also minor reasons for Judith's exclusion: the halakhic stance of the book sometimes differs from that of the rabbis (e.g. Achior did not undergo the full rabbinic ritual of conversion), the book contains obvious historical errors, and the book supports the Hasmonean dynasty, which was out of favor with the rabbis (Moore 1985: 86-91). I would also suggest that the character of Judith herself made the patriarchal societies forming the canons uncomfortable, so uncomfortable that she was excluded from the Jewish canon without a fight, while in Christian circles a lot of interpretation took place to allay this discomfort. Esther, on the other hand, becomes a very popular figure in later Jewish tradition. In Christian tradition Esther and her book are treated more ambivalently, but she has often functioned as a role model for women. Why Esther—why not Judith? Feminist biblical scholarship in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries uncovered the patriarchal culture and assumptions that underlie the litera5. For a thorough discussion of Esther's canonical status in early Christianity, see Moore 1971. 6. The book of Daniel, while written in the second century BCE, presents an evidently convincing fictional setting in the Babylonian and Persian courts.

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ture of the Bible. The books of the Bible were written by men for men, and it is the goal of feminist scholarship to expose that reality, but also to discover 'between the lines' the voice of women from the biblical world. Esther and Judith, both heroines of their respective books, have thus been singled out for particular scrutiny in feminist biblical scholarship. The results have been ambivalent. Neither Esther nor Judith wins universal praise as a feminist heroine, nor do they receive universal condemnation. Esther has been a particularly troubling figure for feminist critics. Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucinda B. Chandler, writing in The Woman's Bible in 1895, praise Esther for 'her unfaltering courage and entire selfabnegation' (Stanton and Chandler 1972: 92). However, the most fulsome praise is reserved for Vashti: Vashti stands out a sublime representative of self-centred womanhood. Rising to the heights of self-consciousness and of self-respect, she takes her soul into her own keeping, and though her position both as wife and as queen are jeopardized, she is true to the Divine aspirations of her nature. (Stanton and Chandler 1972: 88)

Esther is almost damned by faint praise. This ambivalence concerning Esther continues in feminist scholarship to the present day. To quote Alice Laffey: 'In contrast to Vashti, who refused to be men's sexual object and her husband's toy, Esther is the stereotypical woman in a man's world' (Laffey 1988: 216). Esther Fuchs says of Esther, 'she is an agent rather than a genuine hero' (Fuchs 1999: 80). What these critics are sensing is that the book of Esther, although its main character is a woman who acts with considerable skill and bravery to save the Jews from destruction, leaves the patriarchal worldview of the Hebrew Bible intact. As Kristin De Troyer notes, 'The book of Esther is a magnificent short story. Yet it also has a hidden agenda. Between the lines it transmits a code, a norm of behavior for women. This code and this norm is delivered completely from a male point of view' (De Troyer 1995: 55). It is Esther's essential adherence to this norm that makes her sometimes suspect conduct acceptable to her mostly male audience, and may have played some role in her book's eventual canonization. Esther upholds the patriarchal norms of ancient Jewish society in several ways. First of all, she is married (even if it is to a Gentile), a proper role for young women. Her primary characteristic is her beauty; as the object of men's gaze and the king's possession her beauty adds to his honor. In this she is identical to Vashti. Further, she is obedient. She obeys Mordecai, she obeys Hegai; she also obeys the social system in which she

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is located. Esther does not try to alter the patriarchal structure of her society; rather, she works from within the system to gain her ends. And that system is centered on the power of the man over his household. The text identifies the importance of this power center from the first chapter. Vashti defies Ahasuerus's command to come before him and his guests during his banquet (Est. 1.12). Her defiance causes an uproar among the king's (male) councilors because 'this deed of the queen will be made known to all women, causing them to look with contempt on their husbands' (Est. 1.17). The assault is on men as husbands, against the patriarchal household order. So great is the threat that it must be countermanded by law: 'all women will give honor to their husbands, high and low alike' and 'every man should be master in his own house' (Est. 1.20, 22). A Talmudic commentator found this passage amusing, because to him the decree was self-evident. Of course men rule their own houses (b. Meg. 12b). Thus Esther's obedience is a desirable characteristic. It may be objected that Esther is disobedient in her central action in the book, her unsummoned appearance in the throne room. It is true that she is disobedient to the law, but she is not personally disobedient. She does not defy Ahasuerus; rather, she relies on their personal relationship to override the impersonal decree. And the personal husband-wife relationship does take priority, as the king states clearly in LXX Esther, 'What is it, Esther? I am your husband/brother. Take courage; you shall not die, for our law applies only to our subjects' (Add. D.9-10). Thus Esther's primary obedience to her husband remains intact. Esther further fulfills gender stereotypes by her actions. When she gives orders, as in Est. 4.15-16, it is only to servants and family members (the Jews of Susa being broadly construed as family members); she does not take power publicly. She leaves the private quarters of the women only briefly; both her dinner parties take place in private, with only eunuchs (evidently) as witnesses. She does not slay Haman; Ahasuerus sentences him. After Ahasuerus gives her Haman's property, Esther turns its management over to Mordecai. She receives permission from the king to thwart the edict against the Jews, but it is Mordecai who writes the letters and gives the commands. As for the establishment of the festival of Purim, according to the present form of the book Mordecai writes the initial letter and Esther merely confirms it. Only one verse gives a hint that Esther actually exercises public power on her own, 'The command of Queen Esther fixed those practices of Purim, and it was recorded in writing' (Est. 9.32). Finally, at the end of the book Esther completely disappears, and all

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the adulation is reserved for Mordecai, 'for he sought the good of his people and interceded for the welfare of all his descendants' (Est. 10.3). The result of this survey is an Esther who upholds the patriarchal system that undergirds her book. Now, I do not wish to fault Esther for failing to be a twenty-first century feminist! It is unreasonable to expect an ancient character to think and behave as a modern woman. Given the constraints placed upon her, Esther's actions and attainments are wholly admirable. I do think, however, that it is precisely the fact that Esther does uphold the patriarchal social order that helped the book to be accepted eventually as canonical and helps to maintain its popularity. How does Judith fare under the same scrutiny? According to Alice Bellis, Judith is 'perhaps the strongest Hebrew hero in all of biblical literature' (Bellis 1994: 219). Unlike Esther, however, Judith subverts the patriarchal social order of the period. Her main action in the text, and the one that forms the subject of every representation of her, is shocking in a patriarchal world. She herself, at the culmination of an erotic scene, murders the man Holofernes by cutting off his head. The mixture of sex and death in this scene is both irresistible and appalling to a male audience, while many women find it empowering. But this is not the only way in which Judith subverts her patriarchal society. She is introduced with her own genealogy, the longest of any woman in the Hebrew Bible. She is a rich, beautiful, presumably childless widow. All of these terms pose some kind of threat to the patriarchal order. Wealth is meant to be owned and controlled by men, as the book of Esther demonstrates. Judith is not only wealthy in her own right, but her female servant (Jdt. 8.10) manages her property. Judith is beautiful; that is a necessary characteristic in a heroine, but also dangerous if not properly controlled. As a childless widow, Judith is an anomaly in Second Temple Jewish society. Widowhood did give a woman a kind of emancipation, making her a legal entity in her own right, but it was not seen as a desirable state, especially for young women. Remarriage was seen as the best solution for a young widow. There are other famous young biblical widows—Abigail, Bathsheba, Ruth—but they all remarry. Judith is under a further obligation, as a childless widow, to produce an heir for her deceased husband through the law of levirate marriage (Deut. 25.5-10), but she seems to be disregarding that obligation. In this she differs from another biblical widow, Tamar, who goes to extraordinary lengths to perform the levirate obligation (Gen. 34). In fact, since Manasseh has been dead for over three years, it can be inferred that Judith is enjoying her

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emancipated status.7 So, in spite of her reputation for piety, Judith's conduct undercuts the patriarchal order. Her actions too pose a threat to that order. Her first action is to summon the elders of Bethulia and upbraid them for their cowardice. She ignores Uzziah's request that she pray for rain (Jdt. 8.31); rather, she declares that she will devise a plan and carry it out. All of these actions stand in contrast to Esther, to whom Mordecai appeals, and who acts in response to his appeal. Judith then prays and prepares to carry out her daring plan. Although her prayer contains numerous pleas for God's help, the plan is hers and requires her initiative to carry it out. Judith's activities in the enemy camp continue to subvert the patriarchal order. She is a woman unprotected by a male in the all-male sphere of the army camp; only her status as a widow allows her to make the journey at all. She places her sexual virtue in extreme jeopardy, such that she needs to reassure the Bethulians upon her return that it is intact (Jdt. 13.16); and finally she herself wields the sword that kills Holofernes. Again, we may contrast Esther, who is always under the protection of either Mordecai or Ahasuerus, who uses her sexuality only to convince her own husband to heed her, and who allows the males around her to carry out the violence on her enemies. Further, although both Judith and Esther rely on rhetoric to carry out their respective plans, Judith's rhetoric is not simply skillful, but deceptive. In other words, she lies. It is in a good cause, but lying nevertheless. In fact, Judith can be compared to the 'strange woman' so vehemently warned against in Proverbs: With much seductive speech she persuades him; with her smooth talk she compels him. Right away he follows her, 7. The circumstances of Judith' s widowhood, although on the surface unremarkable, foreshadow darker undercurrents in her story. Several verses are set aside to discuss Manasseh's death (Jdt. 8.2-5); he is overcome by heatstroke, and dies at home in his bed. Judith then lives in a tent on the roof of his house, leading a chaste and pious life. The parallels with the death of Holofernes are striking; Holofernes is overcome with wine and he retires to his bed, where he dies. Judith then emerges from his tent, still a chaste and pious widow. Both the men in Judith's life, in other words, are the victims of mysterious ends, and she reaps the benefit. Notice also the final scene with Achior the Ammonite (Jdt. 14.6-10). When Achior sees the head of Holofernes which Judith has cut off, he falls down into a dead faint. Judith once again has a man swooning at her feet, overcome by her actions. Judith's assumption of the masculine role, and the consequent demasculinization of the men around her, is thus emphasized. I would like to thank Susan Houchins for bringing this to my attention.

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and goes like an ox to the slaughter, or bounds like a stag toward the trap until an arrow pierces its entrails. (Prov. 7.21-23)

Finally, at the end of the book, Judith, unlike Esther, does not resubmit herself to patriarchal norms. She retains her anomalous status as a widow, her control over her wealth, and her female servant as her second-incommand. Judith is not subsumed back into the patriarchal order. Any marriage that she might make would continue to undercut the masculine ideal of the patriarchal household, because Judith has already decapitated that ideal. Judith is, in fact, a dangerous woman, dangerous to men because she does not fulfill, and in fact subverts, the gender expectations of her society. According to Pamela Milne, one of the messages of the book is that 'a woman's beauty and sexuality are dangerous to men because women use their attractiveness to deceive, harm and kill men' (Milne 1993: 43).8 This is apparent in Judith not only in her actions toward Holofernes, but in the mysterious death of her husband Manasseh and Achior's fainting spell at the sight of Holofernes' decapitated head. Judith can be acceptable as a Jewish heroine only because her danger is turned away from Israel, toward the enemy. She makes no special claims on Israel beyond saving it. Judith does not retain any leadership position in society; she does not advocate any permanent public role for herself or for any other woman. Her actions and character are unique, but only by remaining unique can they be tolerated by her society. Judith was not considered an acceptable role model for a woman, although she may have been for a Jew. Toni Craven makes the interesting comment that 'the Book of Judith may have stood as good a chance as the Book of Ruth of becoming part of the Hebrew canon had Judith been a male in this story and had Achior been a female' (Craven 1983: 118). However, Judith as a dangerous female must be and is marginalized; this is demonstrated by her exclusion from the Jewish canon (like Vashti's exclusion from the court) and her treatment within Christianity (see presently). Our initial question—Why is Esther so popular and not Judith?—can be answered at least partially like this: the book of Esther, in spite of its theological problems, presents an acceptable model for gender roles in Second Temple Jewish society. The book, while problematic on other levels, is not threatening to that society's status quo. Judith, on the other hand, portrays a dangerous subversion of gender roles. Women like Judith 8.

See also Levine 1992: 17-30.

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were not acceptable in ancient Jewish society, and her book becomes marginalized. In Jewish tradition Judith gradually disappears. In Christian tradition Judith reappears in many guises. She is praised as a model of justice, fortitude, sexual chastity, temperance and humility. She is also used as an anti-model of seduction and eroticism. These two interpretive strains cause an ambiguity in the figure of Judith in Christian tradition, which is not present in the figure of Esther.9 What does this mean for the feminist reader of the Bible? Unfortunately, although Esther and Judith are both admirable heroines, neither of them achieves complete emancipation, either for themselves or other women, from the roles and expectations that society places on women. They represent steps along the way, but the journey is not yet complete.

9. See the fascinating study of Margarita Stocker (1998:61). Stocker states, in the course of a discussion of the use of Judith as a symbol for the struggle of Dutch Protestants for emancipation in the sixteenth century, 'It is significant that, once the Dutch republic was secure, Judith's role in the proselytizing dramas was gradually overtaken by Esther, the canonical Bible's docile yet reforming wife'. Esther is sometimes damned in Christian tradition as 'too Jewish' (e.g. Martin Luther; Paton 1908: 96), but never as 'too feminine'.

ESTHER'S VOLKCENTRISMAND THE REFRAMING OF POST-EXILIC JUDAISM Timothy S. Laniak

How lonely sits the city that once was full of people! How like a widow she has become, she that was great among the nations! She that was a princess among the provinces has become a vassal. She weeps bitterly in the night, with tears on her cheeks; among all her lovers she has no one to comfort her; all her friends have dealt treacherously with her, they have become her enemies. Judah has gone into exile with suffering and hard servitude; she lives now among the nations, and finds no resting place; her pursuers have all overtaken her in the midst of her distress. The roads to Zion mourn, for no one comes to the festivals; all her gates are desolate, her priests groan; her young girls grieve, and her lot is bitter. Her foes have become the masters, her enemies prosper, because the LORD has made her suffer for the multitude of her transgressions; her children have gone away, captives before the foe. From daughter Zion has departed all her majesty. Her princes have become like stags that find no pasture; they fled without strength before the pursuer. (Lam. 1.1-8)'

With such sentiments the pivotal moment of ancient Israel's tragic story was traditionally described. The catastrophe that brought an end to the First Temple period was the cause of destruction, degradation, dislocation and disorientation' (Baly 1976: 177). Defeat at the hands of the Babylonians dispensed to the Judeans the same experience that their northern kin had suffered at the hands of the Assyrians. One of the new realities for some of those who survived the ordeal was a precarious new beginning in 'exile'. Defeat catapulted those with educational, social and political capital into a new center—one that was home to their captors. There would be different rales and different roles. A new generation would emerge with no personal memory of Zion or the events that had displaced them from that sacred home. A new chapter was being written for the Jewish community, one no less significant than (or unrelated to) its first chapter when it initially formed. 1.

All English translations are taken from the NRSV.

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The destruction of Jerusalem and the exile of its key survivors were events that occasioned an identity crisis of unprecedented proportions for the residual community from Judea. These events inaugurated an extended period of re-examination and redefinition, precipitating questions that lasted throughout the Second Temple period: Can we conceive of peoplehood without an independent homeland? Who are we without (or outside of) our traditional homeland? Can we continue to relate to our God when so many of the laws of his Torah assume our presence—and his—in that land? What is to become of the sacred place that was the locus of our worship for three centuries? Could it receive a second life? Can we conceive of our unique religious identity apart from the temple? To whom will we look for human leadership? Will we again be led by divinely appointed kings, priests and prophets? The biblical literature of the exilic and post-exilic periods is saturated with these issues. The passage quoted above contains the standard prophetic explanation of the Nebi 'im (both Former and Latter Prophets), 'we have sinned'. Like the other prophetic writers, the writer of Lamentations ends with longing for a day of restoration and renewal: Restore us to yourself, O LORD, that we may be restored; renew our days as of old—unless you have utterly rejected us, and are angry with us beyond measure. (Lam. 5.21-22)

Hope for the future was framed as something new: a new temple and priesthood, a new anointed ruler, a new covenant. Yet these yearnings and expectations were typically a recasting of the old molds. Prophetic oracles and visions picture a return to the Davidic dynasty, the Levitical (Zadokite) priesthood, worship of YHWH in Zion and a new heart to keep the terms of the Mosaic covenant. The future was a new version of these ancient institutions; prophecy was looking ahead to the past. The exilic and post-exilic hero stories collected in the Ketubim share similar concerns. Through a different kind of literary window, the authors of Daniel, Esther and Ezra-Nehemiah provide another kind of data on the identity crisis that remained in process long after Cyrus formally allowed the repopulation of Yehud. By their perspectives on the lives of those who had been faithful in the diaspora, these writers shared in the reframing process which was underway. The heroes of the diaspora stories were liminal figures who knew how to live simultaneously in two worlds and how to be successful in both. As such they were models for diaspora living (White 1989). They were

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persons who never forgot their primary loyalties and their ultimate commitments. In most of these stories the ancient traditions are re-engaged —whether through daily prayer facing Jerusalem, the reconstruction of its ancient walls, rereading the law and renewing the covenant with YHWH or through repetition of the rites and holidays that had always marked Jewish distinction. Esther is different. This lone, truly diaspora book2 represents a perspective that makes a unique contribution to the refraining of Judaism on each of these crucial issues. Esther seemingly moves away from the traditional paradigms in unexpected and even disturbing ways. In Esther, answers to fundamental concerns are not found at the traditional center but out on the precarious periphery. It represents a perspective that qualifies and reframes the hopes of a community in crisis. While others call for a return to Jerusalem, to temple and Torah, and to the lineages of Israel's ancient leaders, Esther moves away from them. Or, at least, so it seems. Hope in Esther is found in the Jewish community itself. The story reflects a Volkcentric faith that locates redemption in the acts of the Jewish people. Yet, in a subtle way, Esther is a celebration of the very central institutions and perspectives that appear to be missing. Esther invites its readers to re-engage a fundamental understanding of the covenant that stands behind their traditions. Reframing Jebucentric Judaism Diaspora is a term that presupposes exile, but it means more. It refers to ongoing life away from the center. It is by definition a peripheral identity. Esther, like other figures in diaspora stories, lives at the boundaries of two worlds: her Jewish world with its center in Palestine and the Persian world in whose center she now lives. She is marginalized in both contexts, in one by physical distance, in the other by emotional distance. Voices from early in the exilic period naturally and regularly called the Jews back to their God-given homeland. One psalm captures the melancholic nostalgia for Zion: By the rivers of Babylon—there we sat down and there we wept when we remembered Zion. On the willows there we hung up our harps. For there our captors asked us for songs, and our tormentors asked for mirth, saying, 'Sing us one of the songs of Zion!' How could we sing the LORD'S song in 2. Solomon Goitein (1957), quoted in English by Jon Levenson (1976: 446), calls Esther the only true book of the exile because it shows no interest in Eretz Yisrael.

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The Book of Esther in Modern Research a foreign land? If I forget you, O Jerusalem, let my right hand wither! Let my tongue cling to the roof of my mouth, if I do not remember you, if I do not set Jerusalem above my highest joy. (Ps. 137.1-6)

Ezekiel associates the return to Zion with new life for the exiles in his vision of the dry bones: Therefore prophesy, and say to them, Thus says the Lord GOD: I am going to open your graves, and bring you up from your graves, O my people; and I will bring you back to the land of Israel. And you shall know that I am the LORD, when I open your graves, and bring you up from your graves, O my people. I will put my spirit within you, and you shall live, and I will place you on your own soil; then you shall know that I, the LORD, have spoken and will act, says the LORD. (Ezek. 37.12-14)

The centrality of Zion in Jewish consciousness—what we might call Jebucentrism3—is evident also in Daniel's life-risking prayers facing Jerusalem (Dan. 6; 9) and Nehemiah's life-risking request to leave the Persian court to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem (Neh. 2.S-5).4 Esther, however, has barely a single reference to Jerusalem, a simple, seemingly incidental reference in a biographical note.5 The lavish detail in Esther is devoted not to a vision of a new temple, but to the splendor of the Persian court. Resolution takes place in Esther not through returning6 to Palestine, but by remaining7 in Persia. Esther risks her life to save the Jews in Persia with no anticipation of anything better or safer at 'home'. The book closes with an image of stability and prosperity away from home. To be more accurate, Esther closes with the Jews at home in Persia.8 Herein lies the surprising 'message' of Esther to those in the diaspora: it is possible to survive here, out on the edges of our world, at the center of 3. This term reflects Jerusalem's earlier history as a sacred and political center for the Jebusites. 4. Levenson (1976:447) contrasts the request of Zerubbabel that Jerusalem might be rebuilt (1 Esd. 4.43-46) with Esther's request that the diaspora should be safe. 5. In Est. 2.5-6 we read that Mordecai was from the family of Kish who had been 'carried away from Jerusalem among the captives carried away with King Jeconiah of Judah'. 6. The prophets (especially Jeremiah) regularly use forms of the root HI ID to convey both physical return and repentance. 7. Jeremiah (chs. 29-30) had earlier encouraged the exiles to stay in Babylon but only for a designated period of discipline after which they would return to their homeland. 8. Levenson (1976) was perhaps the first to explore a positive evaluation of Esther's deviation from the Zion-centeredness of other post-exilic literature.

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our enemy's universe. We can exist not just temporarily or until we return to Yehud, but indefinitely. Esther is, however, a celebration of more than survival and existence. The story describes a state of legitimacy, success, and prosperity in Persia (Est. 10.3). The result is an affirmation of Jewish peoplehood apart from a homeland, without a sense of peripherality, and with respect for the full potential of Jewish life anywhere. This affirmation is radically Volkcentric. The faith that is promulgated in this story is one that is not limited by regional or even ethnic boundaries. At a time when others would move back to the geographical center of their threatened world and cling to a rebuilt Jerusalem as their only hope for ethnic survival, Esther mediates salvation at the center of the threatening world. As a byproduct of saving her people in Persia, their community swells with converts from the Persian Empire (Est. 8.17). This message of Esther is not without precedent in the ancient traditions of Israel. The covenant with Abraham that promised a land began first with a family. In fact, according to the biblical record, it was not until 500 years later that the extended family of his grandson (the 'sons of Israel') was finally able to settle in that land. In this pre-monarchic, pre-temple era, YHWH is understood to be demonstrating faithfulness to these promises by blessing the family of Israel (= Jacob) and blessing/cursing those who bless/curse them.9 His presence is evident in the lives of the patriarchs through occasional theophany (Gen. 15; 28.10-17) and by a conspicuous prosperity10 even in their various exiles (e.g. Gen. 39.2). The author of Esther skillfully takes motifs from the life of Joseph to reinforce a sense of divine blessing, blessing for her and her kin and for those who treat her well.11 As Joseph's wisdom brings prosperity to the Egyptians and life and status to the Israelites, so Esther's wisdom brings prosperity to the Persians and life and status to the Jews (Laniak 1998: 157-65). YHWH was also present among the ancient Israelites via his TOD (Glory-Cloud), which accompanied the covenant community during their wilderness wandering (e.g. Exod. 16.10). This cloud was a constant, though mobile, theophany. It was understood that YHWH would personally lead them in battle and fight for them as they moved toward their final destination. This kind of physical proximity to and involvement with the

9. This pattern is evidenced in the lives of Abraham (Gen. 12.17-20; 14; 20), Jacob (Gen. 30.27-43), and Joseph (Gen. 39-41). 10. God was 'with Joseph' and 'caused him to prosper' (ITbUQ, Gen. 39.3, 23). 11. For a full treatment of the parallels between Joseph and Esther, see Berg 1979.

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people in their journey was experienced long before there was an identity for 'the place' (DIpQH, Deut. 12.5 et al.}. Only after arriving in the land of promise would God's mobile presence settle at a designated center. His spirit would settle, for a time, in Zion.12 As central as Zion was to much of Israel's theology, Esther is a reminder of the ancient order of priorities: Israel is a people first, and then a place. God is available to them anywhere first, and then at a designated somewhere (cf. 1 Kgs 8.27). Could it be that Esther's one veiled reference to God—as "inN DlpQ (Est. 4.14)—chooses that most ancient of terms for Zion to recall the more fundamental belief that help for the Jews can come from a God who is everywhere? Reframing Torahcentric Judaism The Jebucentric concerns of the exilic and post-exilic Jewish community were complemented by a renewed Torahcentrism. The opening scene in Daniel introduces four Jews who are willing to risk their lives as they resolve to maintain a kosher diet. This keen interest in the cultic dimension of Jewish religion was expressed in prophetic visions of a rebuilt temple and later efforts to rebuild it and begin once again to live according to Mosaic Law. Ezekiel's vision of the dry bones is followed by a vision of a new temple, altar, priests and sacrifices (Ezek. 43-44). This vision recalls many of the details of the Solomonic temple and the priesthood that served in Solomon's day (Zimmerli 1983: 345). The post-exilic prophet Malachi (ch. 1) speaks to the need for purity in worship at the rebuilt shrine on Mt Zion. Hope for a fresh experience of God's protection and blessing would only follow careful obedience to the ancient laws (Mai. 3.8-12). The climax of Ezra's ministry in the book of Nehemiah is the rereading of the Torah followed by the celebration of a Torah holiday (Neh. 8) and confession of covenant breaking (Neh. 9). In the book of Ezra, the prayer of confession is accompanied by radical obedience to Torah laws of purity in marriage (Ezra 9-10). 12. Ezekiel addresses those who would say that to be far from the temple (geographically) was to be far from the Lord (spiritually). With them he laments the departure of the TQD from the temple, but he indicates that God's spirit accompanies the exiles in Babylon: 'Therefore say: Thus says the Lord GOD: Though I removed them far away among the nations, and though I scattered them among the countries, yet I have been a sanctuary (ETfpQ) to them for a little while in the countries where they have gone' (Ezek. 11.16).

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In light of these concerns, what should a reader think of the Jewess whose daily ritual consists of cosmetic baths in preparation for a night with a pagan king? What of the one lost in a courtly crowd whose suspicions are never aroused by any distinctively Jewish behavior? Instead of challenging the king's diet as Daniel once did, she prepares the king's food! This is the one known not for her religious habits, but for her beauty and charm—and her erotic capacities. Her choice is not to reveal her Jewishness, but to avoid risk by concealing it.13 Esther seems flagrantly anti-Torah at a time when others would cling to a distinctly Jewish morality. The only 'religious' activity in the book is a call to fasting and prayer that includes Esther's presumably pagan attendants (Est. 4.16). If this is a veiled reference to mi£Q from the Torah, it is certainly generic and muted. From a biblical perspective, there is a righteousness in Esther, but one more akin to the Wisdom tradition than to the cultic stipulations of the Torah.14 The values in Esther are those of courage, honor, shrewdness, sagacity, loyalty, discretion and discernment. There is no concern for ritual purity and little concern for what modern readers might call 'moral absolutes'. Esther is intensely concerned, however, with knowing and playing by the rules of the game of survival in a very hostile setting. She illustrates 'the successful navigation of countless social dilemmas'.15 Talmon (1963: 441) has located in Esther the classic, court character types of the 'traditional wisdom triangle: the witless dupe, the righteous wise, and the conniving schemer'. Ahasuerus is known for his drinking bouts, unthinking impetuousness and his uncontrolled anger. The Persian king illustrates such proverbs as: Wine is a mocker, strong drink a brawler; and whoever is led astray by it is not wise. The dread wrath of a king is like the growling of a lion; he who provokes him to anger forfeits his life. (Prov. 20.1-2)

Qohelet echoes this sentiment with a lament for the city over which such a king reigns, 13. Even the name 'Esther' suggests something covert; the consonants on which her name is built (~lflD) are the same letters for the Hebrew verb 'to hide, cover'. 14. Shemaryahu Talmon (1963: 426) does a thorough job of mapping the more significant links between Esther and Wisdom literature (biblical and otherwise). Although the use of this material to justify a genre he calls 'historicized wisdom tale' has been disputed, the links are nevertheless helpful. 15. Mariko Asano-Tamanoi (1987: 116) uses this phrase to refer to the maintenance of honor in Japanese society.

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The Book of Esther in Modern Research Woe to you, O land, when your king is a child, and your princes feast in the morning. (Eccl. 10.13)

Haman plays the traditional conniving schemer in the Esther narrative. Anger (^jHp; cf. HEPf) is a defining characteristic of Haman and also, not by coincidence, of the two conspirators whom Mordecai exposes (Est. 2.21). Mordecai, in contrast to Haman, is the wise man known for patience, character and loyalty to the king. The following sayings from the book of Proverbs provide a commentary on the behavior—and the fate—of both Haman and Mordecai: Truthful lips endure forever, but a lying tongue lasts only a moment. Deceit is in the mind of those who plan evil, but those who counsel peace have joy. No harm happens to the righteous, but the wicked are filled with trouble. (Prov. 12.19-21) It is better to be told, 'Come up here', than to be put lower in the presence of a noble. (Prov. 25.7) The wise will inherit honor, but stubborn fools, disgrace. (Prov. 3.35) Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall. (Prov. 16.18) Whoever digs a pit will fall into it, and a stone will come back on the one who starts it rolling. (Prov. 26.27)

The Wisdom tradition balances the cultic literature's emphasis on ritual purity with its own distinctive emphasis on discernment and honorable character.16 Significantly for this discussion, the Wisdom literature merges the vocabulary for guilt (right/wrong) and shame (honor/shame) in character assessments.17 The book of Esther shows a consistent preference for the language of shame with regard to both Mordecai and Haman,18 but in the dramatic account of Esther's accusation of Haman we read: Then King Ahasuerus said to Queen Esther, 'Who is he, and where is he, that would presume to do this?' And Esther said, 'A foe and enemy! This wicked (inn) Haman!' Then Haman was in terror before the king and the queen. (Est. 7.5-6)

16. The Wisdom character profile is evident within the Torah (discussed below). For common elements shared by Wisdom and Deuteronomy, see the comparative analysis of Weinfeld (1992: Part 3 and App. A XII: 244-319, 362-63). 17. According to Talmon (1963: 443), this is a distinctly biblical development. 18. This topic is the primary interest of Laniak 1998.

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Only in this setting is Mordecai's previous act of loyalty referred to as 'good' plEO, Talmon 1963: 445). A kind of traditional morality is indeed present in Esther, but it must be discerned in the cadence of Wisdom discourse. The presence of Wisdom elements in biblical narrative is not unique to Esther. Scholars first noticed a Wisdom background in the Joseph stories.19 Many of the Wisdom motifs in Joseph support the overall patterning of Esther on the Joseph story.20 Patriarchal narratives illustrate the preservation and blessing of YHWH'S chosen ones, even in wandering and 'exile'. In these narratives, so closely tied to the covenant, the morality espoused is one of loyalty to God and kin. Long before the tabernacle and the Ten Commandments, there was evidence of a certain kind of 'success' (noted above) and blessing that was ultimately the result of God's covenantal favor.21 The book of Esther not only affirms a form of traditional Torah morality but also lays subtle claim to ritual regulation on a par with the Torah. Gilles Gerleman (1973) has made the most extensive comparison between Moses/Passover and Esther/Purim, a comparison that is, at points, compelling. Both share the setting in the court, the threat of annihilation, the desire for revenge and the institution of a festival.22 Further, one finds the unusual pairing of leadership (Moses/Aaron and Mordecai/Esther),23 one active in public and one working behind the scenes. In both stories the primary agent of deliverance is hesitant and even resistant. Gerleman is most taken with the ways in which Esther subtly 'one-ups' and thereby coopts the Exodus story: while the Israelites were slaves in Egypt, Esther is confronting the prospect of genocide (Est. 7.4). While the Israelites took the spoils of their enemies (Exod. 12.35-36), the Jews in Esther (we are told three times) did not take any plunder from their enemies (Est. 9.10,15, 16). While the Israelites share a lamb within the household (Exod. 12.46), the Jews during Purim send portions of food abroad (Est. 9.19, 22). 19. See von Rad (1953:120-27); Talmon (1963) considers his own work on Esther to be the complement to von Rad's. 20. Berg's (1979) dissertation builds on many of the insights first noted by Ludwig Rosenthalin 1895. 21. For a comparison of the favor in Esther with the God-given favor in the stories of Joseph and Daniel, see Laniak 1998: 63-65. 22. The patterned presence of these elements (without the festival) has led many to adopt Humphreys' (1973) designation of the genre as 'court-conflict tale'. 23. Note even the correspondence of the same first letters in each name (mem and aleph).

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The most subtle intertextuality may be the most significant: the month of 'fate' in Esther 3 (Nisan) was the very month God had originally chosen for Jewish triumph in the first chapter of their history (cf. Levenson 1997: 73). The specific date that the edict of annihilation was issued was the day Jewish readers would recognize as the eve of Passover (3.12). On this very day Esther called for a radical fast24 for both Jews and her personal attendants (Est. 4.16). Though Gerleman's treatment over-reads the significance of the borrowed allusions, he has provided us with provocative evidence for Torah precedents in Esther. Esther is not, as Gerleman sees it, a replacement of Mosaic history and law; it is a continuation of it. Haman reincarnates the ancient threat to Jewish existence, finding by his own 'ritual' (the casting of the/?wr) an occasion for their extermination. Like the early chapters of Exodus, Esther is a narrative of deliverance followed by a law that requires its annual re-dramatization. Esther, in the end, affirms Israel's traditions by creating new Torah. It demonstrates that such a dramatic deliverance of God's chosen people ought to be institutionalized any time it occurs. Reframing Natocentric Judaism Diaspora realities and faulty attempts to regain/realize the lost kingdom fueled a search for legitimate leadership throughout the Second Temple period. Jeremiah and Ezekiel presented early exilic anticipation of a Davidic shepherd (Jer. 22.30 et al.\ Ezek. 34.23; 37.24). In Ezra (3.2 et al.\ Nehemiah (12.1), Zechariah (4.6 et al.) and Haggai (1.1 et al.) hope was tied to the historic figure of Zerubbabel, a scion of David. In exilic and post-exilic expectations for cultic leadership, concern for pedigree was intense as well. In Ezekiel's visions the true Levitical priesthood must be Zadokite (Ezek. 44.15-31). In a later period, the Chronicler would have much to say about the lineages of the priestly castes in his presentation of Israel's glorious past (1 Chron. 5.27-41; 6.1-15, 16-32, 39-66 [MT 6.1-47, 54-81]). It appears that for most Jews at the dawn of the Second Temple period, hopes for a renewed national existence were anchored in male leadership from these traditional royal and priestly lineages. In Esther the only Jewish person with a promising pedigree is Mordecai. His Saulide lineage is mentioned only incidentally (or so it seems) when

24. It is unusual to call for a fast 'night and day'. This is an urgent 'intercessory' fast(Clines 1984b: 36-37).

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he is introduced to the readers in Est. 2.5. Yet Mordecai cannot save the Jews, even with his impressive record of loyal service to the foreign king. In fact, it is Mordecai who endangers his people by the predicament his convictions, and his pedigree, bring about. It is not by coincidence that Mordecai and Haman are introduced by way of ancestors who gave them royal prerogatives. As such, both are expected to act upon long-standing tribal enmities (Laniak 1998: 73-78). The savior of the Jews in Esther is an orphaned, Jewish, female exile. Esther is called upon to save Mordecai and their kin. Esther has no legitimacy by blood and seems unlikely and disqualified on every count. Esther reframes a norm we might call Natocentrism with an unexpected egalitarianism. She meets no traditional criteria for leadership. And yet, Israel's ancient traditions are rich with examples of unlikely leaders. Had not the 'biblical' tradition trained its hearers to expect the unexpected and the unorthodox?25 The barren mother motif in biblical narrative signals the arrival of a child who is miraculously produced. Isaac, Joseph and Samuel thus represent divine provision for the fulfillment of divine promises. The choice of Abel over Cain, of Jacob over Esau, of Joseph (and Judah) over Reuben, of Ephraim over Manasseh and of Moses over Aaron suggests that the sacred laws of firstborn rights (Deut. 21.17) could be qualified. Esther, the orphan, is one more unorthodox exception in the line of Israel's leaders. Esther has something in common with ancient heroes like Gideon, a type of leader who is 'chosen' precisely because of his lack of pedigree (Judg. 6.15). Like Deborah (and Jael), Esther is called to rescue her people when the expected male leader is incapable of doing so. At the center of a pagan kingdom—with its own oversensitivities regarding gender boundaries (Est. 1.18) and its lineage-based hierarchy26—the outsider Esther accomplishes what no one else could. Esther is a bridge between two patriarchal worlds with no inherited status in either. Esther mediates life and a new order for both worlds from the margins of each. The book of Esther is not simply a narrative critique of androcentrism and traditionally respected bloodlines. In the last chapter the heroine recedes into an invisible role as her cousin Mordecai takes his place as second in the kingdom behind Ahasuerus (Laniak 1998:164-65). The story

25. I maintain an early date for the Torah and, therefore, consider the following examples to represent sacred tradition prior to the writing of Esther. 26. See, e.g., Strabo's Geography 15.3.20.

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celebrates the dramatic leadership of a marginal female figure during a time of crisis, but its denouement signals a return to the patriarchal norms it has qualified. Like Deborah or Judith, Esther's role makes a counterpoint, but it does not comprehensively challenge the paradigm. These figures are embraced anomalies. Like Ruth or Tamar (and unlike Vashti), Esther is a willing participant in the 'rules' of patriarchy and brings about the desired results of her more 'legitimate' elders. Esther draws from the well of sacred tradition as much as any literature of the post-exilic period. The result is something more enduring than the temple or even the lineages of Israel's leaders: the hope of salvation is found in any Jew. Reframing Yahwehcentric Judaism The final word of Ezekiel is the name of the new Jerusalem, 'YHWH is there' (Ezek. 48.35). The climax to the great visions of this prophet is the presence of God, explicitly named YHWH. This is not merely the name of a regional or ethnic deity; it is the name of the God to whom all nations owe allegiance. The shared theme of the stories (and visions) in Daniel is the revelation of the God of the Jews as the one true God (Dan. 2.47; 3.28; 4.2-3, 34-37; 5.17; 6.26-27). In the writing prophets, one need look no further than Isaiah 40-55 to hear the same message in lofty poetic verse. Exiles were to be encouraged by visions and sermons about the specific God who controlled the great empires with an enduring regard for the welfare of his chosen ones. Zechariah's Day of the Lord is an image of world hegemony under the one king, YHWH, 'On that day, the LORD (YHWH) will become king over all the earth; on that day the LORD (YHWH) will be one and his name one' (Zech. 14.9). Zechariah's future involves all nations in the legitimate worship of YHWH on Mt Zion. While prophets and poets were reconfessing their traditional God, finding in their tragedies nothing other than the predicted curses of a broken covenant with YHWH, Esther brings hope without explicitly mentioning the God of Israel. Esther provides a dazzling description of the Persian palace, but not a word about the throne of YHWH. The Persian king is mentioned 190 times, but YHWH not once. There are no traces of Yahwistic faith in a Jewish temple, in Jewish religious practices or even in the mention of the sacred name. Efforts to find YHWH in Esther are as old as the Septuagint, whose 'Additions' reveal him in all the 'expected' places. Two Targums followed—one twice as long as MT Esther—systematically filling in each of the theological gaps. Yet many wonder if efforts such as these

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simply betray an unwillingness to accept the uncertain presence of God in the book.27 If YHWH is to be found in the book of Esther, he is to be found in the actions of its central character. In a moment of community crisis she is the most tangible evidence of the saving presence of God. Here again a comparison with Israel's Wisdom traditions proves helpful. While it is true that Israel shared with its ancient Near Eastern neighbors much of what is termed the Wisdom tradition, there is also evidence of a distinctly Yahwistic perspective (Murphy 1987). The widely accepted 'secular' doctrine of reward and punishment is understood, in the biblical version, as nothing other than the hand of God. A proverb may explicitly refer to ultimate causality, 'The blessing of the Lord makes rich' (Prov. 10.22), or 'The fear of the Lord prolongs life' (Prov. 10.27). It is more likely, however, that YHWH is implied, 'The righteous are delivered from trouble' (Prov. 11.8). The 'divine passive' is well attested in Hebrew Scripture. If Israel's Wisdom literature provides another way of expressing its orthodoxy—with a characteristic awareness of the divine in circumstance and chance—then Esther makes a perfectly 'biblical' statement about the hand of God in coincidence and peripety. Muted allusion to the presence of YHWH in time and space is characteristic of the Wisdom tradition. An overall sense of causality, however, is not all that Esther reveals about YHWH. The innerbiblical echoes of ancient hero stories would inevitably guide the ancient Jewish listener back to pivotal moments in Israel's Heilsgeschichte through which YHWH was revealed. Along with deliverer motifs that Esther shares with Joseph and Moses, there appear other elements of holy war that resonate throughout the story and recall the conquest. Surely the 'dread' (IPIS, Est. 8.17; 9.2, 3) that fell on the enemies of the Jews would be understood as a reflection of that ancient and expected response to a display of God's power (Deut. 2.25; 11.25).28 It is an awe that may lead enemies of the Jews to surrender (Josh. 9.24; but see 1 Sam. 4.7) and, on occasion, to join their ranks (Josh. 9.24; Est. 9.3).29 As 27. Michael Fox (199la: 246-47), especially, questions the veiled presence of YHWH assumed by most commentators. 28. It might be significant that one of the names for God from the patriarchal period is, literally, the 'Fear of Isaac' (pniT 1HS, Gen. 31.42, 53b). 29. The common root NT was also used to express the fear of the enemies, and it is this verb that is used in Josh. 9.24 and 1 Sam. 4.7 cited here. In Josh. 2, the Canaanites experience dread (HQ^S, v. 9) and 'melting hearts' (Josh. 2.11, 24), when such a condition leads Rahab to side with the Israelites.

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a result of this awesome and attractive power displayed by (or through) the Jews, many 'become Jews'.30 At the conclusion of the conquest accounts there is a summary of what appears to be the telos of the preceding narrative, 'And the land had rest (Hftp52?) from war' (Josh. 11.23). This summary is restated in Josh. 21.44, but in this case it uses a different verb (Pin) and provides the subject, 'The LORD (YHWH) gave you rest' (Josh. 22.4; 23.1). This verb is used in Esther to describe the result of the fighting. They were to celebrate on the fourteenth and fifteenth of Adar, 'as the days on which the Jews gained relief (\rCi) from their enemies' (Est. 9.22). Was the rest that they realized the result of their own hands exclusively or was it partially or ultimately the result of an unseen divine hand? The 'theology' of Esther hangs on the answer to this question. Why is it that in a foreign land—when Israel most needed to hear the name and to see the hand of her God—there is no mention of him clearly, not even once? Is it possible that this 'secular' book, by deliberate indirection, understatement, 'implicity' and intertextuality, provides an unanticipated perspective on God that ultimately supports traditional theology? The post-exilic period was typically a time for Jewish longing for Zion and a concern to see the community and the world recognize the name of YHWH. Yet if those longings were not qualified in some way, they could (and did) lead to a desperate sense of dislocation from YHWH. The book of Esther presents Israel's God as an unnamed force in the lives of the Jews of Persia. This force is only recognizable to those familiar with YHWH'S presence in Israel's sacred past and ancient traditions. By its seemingly exclusive interest in the Jewish community, Esther provides a qualification to the other sources of identity and hope in the post-exilic period. The message is not that Jerusalem and Zion do not matter, but that aliyah (return to Zion) is only one way to regain the center. It is not that Torah is unimportant, but that halakah (prescribed observance of the law) is only one way to honor the law. It is not that the naming of YHWH is irrelevant, but that formal confession is only one way to demonstrate faith. It is not that the traditionally recognized lineages of male leadership are unnecessary for the community, but that they do not exhaust the prospects for deliverance.

30. On the range of likely meanings for the hithpael of 171' in Est. 8.17, see Levenson!997: 117.

DOUBLE TAKE: ANOTHER LOOK AT THE SECOND GATHERING OF VIRGINS IN ESTHER 2.19A Elizabeth Groves

Esther 2.19, which follows Esther's selection and coronation as queen, begins rniZJ HI Tim j*3pi"Ql ('At a second gathering of virgins'). At Esther2000, in casual conversation with various scholars, I learned for the first time that this clause, Est. 2.19a, is viewed as highly problematic, so difficult to explain that scholars pull their hair out over it, and some eventually give up in despair and dismiss it entirely. A subsequent perusal of an assortment of commentaries on this passage almost unanimously confirmed this view. I could not have been more surprised. Esther 2.19a seems to me, as a dramatist of the book of Esther,1 to fit comfortably and effectively within the text as a whole, and thus its dismissal seems to me a pity. In the spirit of David Clines' paper in the present volume encouraging the inclusion of non-scholarly perspectives,2 I am thankful for the opportunity to set forth a few thoughts on the verse for the consideration of scholars and others. I think most people would agree that the story of Esther is dramatic. From ancient times up to the present day, it has provided excellent material for storytellers and audiences. One of the important themes of the book is that of the danger Esther faced when she went to the king unbidden. I believe 2.19a supports that theme. Esther's position as queen 1. I perform dramatic recitations of various texts, including the book of Esther. My contribution to the Esther2000 symposium was a presentation in which I recited and dramatized the book in its entirety, using the NIV. All quotations in this article are taken from the NIV. 2. While I am not a scholar, I do have a rudimentary knowledge of Hebrew, and I have access to the expertise of my husband, Alan Groves, who is a professor of Hebrew. It was only recently that I took the plunge into the study of Persian history, but I must say the swim has been most enjoyable.

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was not nearly as secure as modern readers might be inclined to assume, and her fear that the king would not welcome her into his throne room was very real and very well justified. While modern readers perceive this theme, the original readers and audiences of Esther would have been even more keenly aware of it, because they were more familiar with the Achaemenid kings and because they understood the place of women in Persian culture. Ancient and modern readers alike depend on clues found throughout the text leading up to ch. 4, where Esther faces her life-anddeath decision to defy the king.31 believe that Est. 2.19a is one of these clues. The allusion in 2.19a to a second gathering of virgins that had already taken place during the years between Esther's coronation and the terrifying decision she faced in ch. 4 serves as a signal, a reminder, to the audience that Esther's position of influence over King Ahasuerus was tenuous. In combination with other hints imbedded in the text, 2.19a serves to make the audience uncomfortably aware that Ahasuerus did not regard Esther with the boundless esteem that would be necessary to outweigh his rage at her direct defiance of Persian law. The odds of her surviving the trip to his throne room, much less of obtaining the large favor she intended to ask, were heavily stacked against her. Having now read the views of various scholars on Est. 2.19a, I better appreciate that the clause presents a puzzle and that its explanation/interpretation is not immediately obvious. However, I will argue that it can be reasonably explained and that it does indeed fit and belong in the text of Esther. L.B. Paton(1908: 186) says of Est. 2.19, 'what is meant by second is a crux interpretum\ and Carey Moore (1971: 29) says that the verse is one of the most difficult verses in all of Esther, primarily because of the wordsemt, 'a second time'. Paton's detailed summaries (1908: 186-87) of the interpretations of dozens of scholars proves conclusively only one thing: there are almost as many different explanations for senit as there are commentators on it.

A sampling of such proposed explanations of the clause HI Tim j*3pi"

HI Tim follows. (1) Paulus Cassel (1888: 77) states, 'this verse remained obscure to former commentators, and especially in ancient times, so that the LXX omitted 3. All arguments in this paper are based on the Masoretic Text (MT). While the Septuagint (LXX) elaborates on Esther's danger and her awareness of it, I believe this theme was amply developed in the MT itself, even without the LXX'S Additions.

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it altogether. But this was very wrong. The verse occupies an important position'. He goes on to say that: the elevation of Esther to the rank of queen had not at all interrupted the routine of the harem. Ahashverosh indeed loved Esther, but of the tyrannical Persian lust of women he had not given up a particle. The temptation to continually acquire new wives was as strong with him as ever, and he could not subdue his sensual infirmities and love of extravagance. He did not issue a decree to recall and annul his former one for the seeking out of women, although his heart had found satisfaction in Esther. The narrator intentionally brings out the contrast. 'Look', says he, 'just now the king has shown that he loved Esther above all women, and yet other women are so soon sought!'...[the narrator] wishes to say: 'Scarcely had the feast of Esther taken place, when they again began to collect virgins; and so apparently the power of the new queen had already begun to decline'. (Cassel 1888: 77-78)

(2) Robert Gordis (1974: 30) appears to be happy with the text as it stands when he proposes that 'it is a reasonable assumption that the festivities marking Esther's coronation were climaxed by a second procession of all the contestants, whose beauty served all the more effectively to highlight Esther's gentle beauty, which had won the king's love'. (3) Hans Bardtke and others hold the view that the second gathering referred to some of the same girls who were actually 'gathered' as part of the process described in 2.1-4 and 8, but who arrived too late—that is, after Esther was crowned (Moore 1971: 30). (4) Another proposal is that the second gathering was of girls who came for the 'banquet of Esther'.4 (5) Perhaps the second gathering was of girls who came in hopes of being chosen as ladies-in-waiting (Levenson 1997: 63). (6) F. Vatable and J. Mariana think that there was a similar gathering of girls before Vashti was chosen and that 'second' refers to the gathering from which Esther was taken (Paton 1908: 187). (7) Carey Moore (1971: 30)—seemingly sympathetically—ascribes to H. Grotius the view that this passage is retrogressio, referring back to the gathering of 2.8: 'The author uses here the phrase "when virgins were being gathered" in the sense of "at that time" (cf. vs 21), that is, in those days when various virgins were being assembled, referring to that very 4. Levenson lists this (4) and the following (5) as two of many proposed interpretations of the verse. I did not encounter either of these in my reading, so I am not sure which scholars espouse them (Levenson 1997: 63).

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collection of which Esther herself had been a part'. In other words, the same girls and the same gathering were in view.5 (8) J. Clericus and J.J. Rambach suppose that the first gathering occurred in the provinces, and the second at Susa (Paton 1908: 187). (9) Tar gum Sheni hypothesized that the king ordered the second gathering of virgins in order to provoke Esther into telling him her ethnic background. (10) Michael Fox and others6 argue that 'second' should be taken as referring to the second house of women, for example, that overseen by Shaashgaz. In other words, the second gathering of virgins was when they were regathered from their night in the king's house into the second part of the harem (Fox 1991a: 38, 276-77). (11) Gilles Gerleman thinks 'second' should be taken to mean 'a second thing [to be said]' about the gathering (Fox 199la: 277). (12) Moore endorses Ernst Ehrlich's proposal to emend the text slightly, fromrrD^ ('second') to m^ttf ('various'). Moore's translation of the verse then reads, 'Now when various virgins were being gathered together and Mordecai was sitting at the King's Gate'. He points out that the Dead Sea Scrolls clearly illustrate that it is easy to confuse ^ and "1 (Moore 1971: 30). (13) The LXX and others omit the verse entirely (Paton 1908: 187). No doubt there are yet other interpretations of this clause, but these examples will suffice to demonstrate that a confident understanding of it is an elusive commodity. There are three items in the clause rP3C? ni^lfD f*3p!"Q1 that suggest an interpretation which recognizes two distinct, separate gatherings of virgins. The first is obvious: the word rntft. In the most ordinary sense of the term, it refers to a second something that follows a first one of the same thing. Getting around this clear and conventional understanding of the word 'second' requires some rather complex argumentation.7 Second, the temporal infinitive clause is used eight times in Esther (1.5; 2.7, 8 [twice], 12, 15, 19; 9.25). In each case, except 2.12, this clause construction functions temporally; that is, it is chronologically subsequent to the action in the preceding narration, and it marks the time setting for what follows. A second gathering of virgins and Mordecai's sitting at the 5. Paton (1908: 187) suggests that Vatable, Mariana, Clericus and Rambach share this view with Grotius. 6. Paton (1908: 186) provides a list of 15 scholars who hold this view. 7. Of course the lack of details concerning a 'second' gathering does complicate a conventional understanding.

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king's gate actually function together as a unit that temporally marks what follows.8 ('At a second gathering of virgins—Mordecai was sitting at the king's gate—Esther was doing such and such.') This is significant for the question of whether or not there was in fact a second gathering of virgins, for the following reason. Just as in 2.19 the second gathering and Mordecai's sitting at the gate are linked as a temporal unit, in 2.21-22 Mordecai's sitting at the king's gate is also temporally linked (both linguistically and logically) to his uncovering of the assassination plot and to Esther's being queen. If A (a second gathering) and B (Mordecai sitting at the king's gate) were contemporaneous, and if B (Mordecai sitting at the king's gate), C (Mordecai uncovers the assassination plot) and D (Esther is already queen when Mordecai tells her about the plot), were contemporaneous, then all four items—A, B, C and D—would seem to have occurred during the same time period. The verbatim repetition of the disjunctive clause ""[^ftn "IU2D 22T "TD"!"!^ ('and Mordecai was sitting at the king's gate') ties together the two sets of temporally linked material. If this is correct, then the second gathering of virgins at 2.19a must have been something that happened in the time period after Esther had become queen. It was indeed a second gathering, subsequent to the one from which Esther was chosen.9 Third, it is noteworthy that there is no article with the noun ni^lfD in the clause PH^D mVirQ j^pPm. While on occasion nouns in Hebrew must be treated as definite even without the article, the lack of the article here is suggestive. If the article were present, that is, if the king 'gathered the virgins' a second time, one would most naturally think the same virgins were involved as in the first gathering. Without the article, that is, if the king simply 'gathered virgins', it would be more natural to assume that other virgins were in view. 8. The disjunctive clause about Mordecai sitting at the king's gate actually interrupts the infinitive clause of 2.19a (gathering virgins) and the clause it governs in 2.19c (Esther keeping her identity secret) and serves as an aside to further specify the time period being identified. 9. In fairness, it should be noted that Mordecai could have been in the habit of sitting at the king's gate for a long time, possibly even before Esther was crowned. Thus, the case for the contemporaneous nature of these events is not airtight.

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Having noted these things, I will now evaluate the views outlined earlier, in the order given. (1) In my opinion, Cassel hits upon the main point of the second gathering of virgins, namely, that Ahasuerus's attentions were not exclusively toward Esther. However pleased he was with her in vv. 17-18, her position as the primary object of the king's interest was short-lived and very far from secure. (2) Gordis's proposal that the second gathering of the virgins was actually a parade of the contestants from the first gathering, displayed to magnify the superlative beauty of Esther, seems reasonable conjecture to me, as a dramatist. Such a parade would glorify not only Esther, but— more importantly—Ahasuerus himself. This would fit nicely with the book's portrayal of Ahasuerus's character. Such a display would have stroked his pride and gratified his ego. (3) The view that the second gathering refers to the girls who arrived too late, after Esther had already been chosen, seems weaker to me. It had been at least twelve months since the virgins of Susa were taken to the palace.10 While Ahasuerus's kingdom was immense, it seems unlikely that it would have taken any of the girls a full year to reach Susa. (4) Esther's banquet was given 'for all the king's nobles and officials' (probably men only, as in ch. 1). Perhaps there was a women's banquet given as well, as in ch. I. 11 (5) Would virgins have been gathered to select ladies-in-waiting for Esther? I cannot say. Perhaps the same girls who were gathered the first time were recalled from the harem to be culled for special service as Esther's ladies. (6) Was Esther's gathering 'the second' after Vashti's had been 'the first'? 2.1-4 strikes the reader as being a novel idea on the part of the king's attendants, not a proposal of a rerun, but it is possible that such a gathering could have been used to select Vashti. However, if it is the case that 2.19-22 describes events that happened at the same time, as argued 10. Whether or not a twenty-first-century reader takes that as literally twelve months or as an exaggeration indicating some long period of time, within the confines of the story itself that is how long the girls' preparation is said to have lasted. 11. Would virgins have been rounded up from all over the empire to attend it? It seems unlikely to me. Virgins were gathered for the king's sake, not for their own, nor because it would be jolly for them to have a holiday in the capital. Would local virgins have been gathered to celebrate Esther's banquet? Possibly. I don't know enough about Persian customs to answer that question.

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above, then the second gathering would have taken place after Esther was already queen. (7) The same argument would undermine Grotius's view that the second gathering referred back to the same gathering described in 2.8. If it is true that the linguistic structure of 2.19a indicates that it is subsequent to 2.18 and that events described in 2.19-22 are contemporaneous, then Esther would already have been queen when the second gathering happened. (8) Were the first and second gatherings in the provinces and in Susa respectively? This is possible, although it is interesting that Esther, who lives in Susa (2.5), and the girls who were brought to Susa from other places are mentioned together in 2.8.12 Furthermore, as mentioned above, the second gathering appears to have been something that happened after Esther was already queen. (9) I have trouble imagining this scenario. It seems to me that Ahasuerus, who had absolute power over the immense Persian empire, who held the lives of his subjects in his hands and who could do anything he pleased, would not have had the slightest trouble discovering Esther's nationality if he had wished to do so. I do not think he would have had to wheedle, plead and manipulate Esther by initiating grand schemes to make her jealous. (10) Fox's view that the second gathering refers to the stage of the process at which the virgins were regathered into the second house of the women after their night with the king is well argued. It takes seriously the word rntft ('second') and tries to make sense of it in connection with another thing described in the larger passage that is clearly a 'second' something, that is, the part of the harem supervised by Shaashgaz. His argument that the women were gathered 'again' (as in 'a second time') into the harem makes sense. If I felt constrained to explain away an actual second gathering of virgins (which I do not, but which many people do), I would probably subscribe to this view. If, however, it is true that 2.19-22 describes contemporaneous events, then the second gathering would have been one which happened after Esther was already queen and not any gathering of which she had been a part prior to her coronation, such as her graduation with her classmates into the next level of the harem.

12. Note that elsewhere in the book events in Susa and in the provinces are delineated separately. See 1.5; 3.15; 8.14,15-17; and, inch. 9, w. 6-15 contrasted with v. 16, and v. 17 contrasted with v. 18, then v. 19, making the contrast explicit and succinct.

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(11) Fox (1991a: 277) critiques Gerleman's view as follows: 'this expedient helps little, because the suggested usage is too elliptical and not paralleled elsewhere (certainly not by Gerleman's example, 2 Sam. 16.19), and because "a second thing" would be meaningless here—Esther's obedience is not a "second thing" to be said about the gathering of virgins'. (12) I believe it is the case that there is no manuscript evidence for emending rn£> ('second') to HIDIZ? ('various'), other than the argument that * and 1 are easily confused. However, the fact that Moore and Ehrlich propose the emendation shows how strongly the word fPD^ as it stands implies an interpretation which recognizes an actual second gathering. I will argue that very good sense can be made of the verse just as it is, which would render an emendation unnecessary. (13) It is perhaps ironic that the LXX omits this clause. I believe that 2.19a strengthens the theme of Esther's danger, which the LXX also strives to do in some of its additions. If the LXX translators desired to emphasize Esther's plight, and yet they omitted this verse, that would seem to show that even as early as the time of the LXX translation the significance of 2.19a was missed. Why does this clause pose such difficulties? If it were possible to approach this verse in isolation from its context, there would be no particular reason to doubt that it describes an event that was a repeat of a previous action: namely, gathering virgins. Taken at face value, read with greatest simplicity, m® ni^lfD "jOpPQ ('At a second gathering of virgins...') seems to refer to a separate gathering of virgins, like the one described in 2.1-4 and 8, but subsequent to it. The same verb is used in each instance, the same activity seems to be described, and 2.19 explicitly calls this gathering 'the second', presumably of like kind with the first, which has already been described in detail. Why not take it at face value then, and understand the text to say that there was in fact a second gathering? Why engage in such hermeneutical gymnastics to explain away a second gathering and to find some other way to interpret the clause? Because, in addition to the fact that there is neither intra- nor extra-biblical evidence for a second gathering of virgins, such a second gathering simply seems to make no sense in the flow of the story. Readers find themselves thinking, 'What possible reason could there have been for a second gathering? Surely the text can't really mean what it says.' And so they feel constrained to try to find some other way to explain it. However, if it could be reasonably demonstrated that 2.19a made good, solid sense and served a literary or dramatic purpose in the text, perhaps scholars and others would be comfortable interpreting the clause simply and straightforwardly.

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As a dramatist, I think 2.19a makes very good sense in the story and serves an important purpose effectively. I maintain that 2.19a serves very effectively to underscore the theme of Esther's danger in approaching the king uninvited. As stated earlier, I believe that Esther's decision to approach the king placed her in great, even mortal, danger. My belief is based on: (1) extra-biblical sources that describe the power of the Achaemenid kings and the place of women within Persian society; (2) aspects of the book of Esther that reflect the same view of the Achaemenid rulers and of Persian attitudes toward women; and (3) clues in the text of Esther (including 2.19a) that shed light specifically on the precarious nature of Esther's situation. The remainder of this article will be devoted to an examination of each of these three factors in turn and then to an argument that Est. 2.19a does indeed function as one of the clues mentioned in point (3) above. Ancient audiences were at something of an advantage over most modern readers because they were familiar with the Achaemenid rulers, at least by reputation, and because they understood intuitively the place women commonly occupied in ancient societies. In order to catch up with ancient readers, we will take a cursory look at these topics. How might one characterize the Achaemenid kings? Even for the most powerful men in the empire, the Achaemenid monarchs were not easy rulers to deal with (see Herodotus 3.31-36; 7.10,39; 8.90,118-19). Karen Jobes says of ch. 1, 'The point is that the Persian court was not a safe place because Xerxes13 held great power, and he wielded it unpredictably, making decisions from dubious motives with impaired judgment... When such absolute power is combined with decadence and ruthlessness, no one is safe' (Jobes 1999: 69). Ahasuerus was not a man to trifle with, for man or woman, nobleman or queen. Ancient audiences would have been aware of this and would have recognized the danger Esther faced in defying him. They would also have known where Esther, as a woman, stood in relation to the king. What was the role of women in Persia? Herodotus reports 'Now it is the worst of all taunts in Persia to be called worse than a woman' (Herodotus 9.107).14 The Persian view and treatment of women 13. While there is some disagreement as to the historical identity of Ahasuerus, many believe that he was the Achaemenid king known by the Greek name Xerxes. 14. Herodotus also says that 'Every Persian marries many lawful wives and more concubines' (Herodotus 1.135 [translations from Herodotus follow Godley's [1924] edition]), and that 'A man's wives would go to his bed in rotation' (Herodotus 3.69).

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were in large measure the same as have been found elsewhere in the ancient Near East and in the greater number of societies throughout much of recorded history (and to this day in some parts of the world). Women belonged to the men who were in authority over them. If I say they were 'belongings' rather than 'property', the word choice connotes a qualitative difference and recognizes that wives and daughters were viewed with higher regard than objects, livestock or slaves. But they were, nonetheless, often given, taken and traded as valuable items in social/political/economic contracts. Men brokered agreements, and women were among the commodities exchanged in them.15 A woman belonged to her father while single, and then to her husband, and an offense to her was an offense to him and to his honor. In ch. 7, it is to the king's honor that Esther appealed when she told him that she (and her people) had been sold for slaughter (see Laniak 1998: 112-15). The perpetration of such an act against Ahasuerus's wife constituted an unspeakable insult to his own honor. Similarly, Haman's audacity in falling on Esther's couch was an irreparable affront to the king. Life was about the men. To a certain extent, what happened to women mattered only in so far as it honored or shamed the men to whom they belonged. When Xerxes fell in love with his brother's wife, it was 'out of regard for his brother Masistes' that Xerxes 'would not force her to his will' (Herodotus 9.108).16 Masistes' wife's interest in the affair was of no consequence; only out of regard for her husband did Xerxes not pursue the matter.17

By Plutarch's report, 'the Barbarian folk are terribly jealous in all that pertains to the pleasures of love, so that it is death for a man, not only to come up and touch one of the royal concubines, but even in journeying to go along past the wagons on which they are conveyed' (Artaxerxes 26). Plutarch also reports that Artaxerxes 'kept 360 concubines of surpassing beauty' (Artaxerxes 27 [translations from Plutarch follow Perrin's [1926] edition]). 15. See Clarisse Herrenschmidt's fascinating article tracing the patterns of wifeexchange practiced by the Achaemenid kings and Persian nobles (Herrenschmidt 1987). 16. Note that this self-restraint on Xerxes' part may have been out of character for him and therefore noteworthy enough for Herodotus to mention. 17. Later in the same episode, after Xerxes's wife Amestris had tricked Xerxes into promising to give Masistes' wife to her to torture (Herodotus 9.111), Herodotus reports that Xerxes did not want to give up Masistes' wife to Amestris, partly because she was actually guiltless of the deed of which Amestris suspected her, but more importantly because 'Xerxes held it a terrible and wicked act to give up his brother's wife' (Herodotus 9.110).

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Numerous other examples of women's roles and treatment could be cited.18 Nowhere is there an indication that women had the smallest say in decisions that affected them, except in the case of one woman, Aspasia, whose assent to a match may well have been sought only because her expected refusal would have provided Artaxerxes with an excuse not to grant his son's request to have her (Plutarch, Artaxerxes 26-27). Women's lives were decided by men, and women were expected to obey. Esther's disobedience of her husband's rules and of Persian law was tantamount to treason, as ancient audiences well knew. We do know of queens who managed to wield considerable power, or at least influence, within the male-dominated system.19 How did these women accomplish this? Only by manipulating the king into granting their desires, one case at a time. There were certain occasions on which the king was required to grant boons asked of him (Herodotus 9.110-11; Plutarch, Artaxerxes 26). These were the moments to seize upon, as ancient audiences would have realized. The only other possibility was to so please the king as to cajole him into making a blank-check promise to grant anything the cajoler asked (Herodotus 9.109).20 This was the way to power for the women (and men of lesser power) in the king's palace. It was the only option available to Esther, and she used it. Esther did not find herself in a situation, such as the king's birthday

18. See, for instance, Herodotus 3.31-32, 69, 88; 9.108; Plutarch, Artaxerxes 16; 17; 23; 27. 19. Atossa, Xerxes' mother, was called 'all powerful' (Herodotus 7.3). If Herodotus is to be believed, Xerxes' wife Amestris was a jealous, vengeful, even bloodthirsty woman who knew how to play the system and managed to get what she wanted most of the time (Herodotus 7.114; 9.111-13). What she wanted often resulted in a reign of terror for those who crossed her, willfully or inadvertently. Parysatis, the mother of Xerxes' descendant Artaxerxes II, is portrayed by Plutarch as following admirably in Amestris's footsteps in her achievement of power, influence and brutality during her son's reign (Artaxerxes 14, 16, 17, 19). 20. In one incident, Xerxes promised a young woman, Artaynte, anything she wanted in return for her favors. But clearly, as the text itself states, Xerxes never dreamed she would ask him to give her the spectacular mantle that his wife had made for him. It might be observed that even when one received the king's promise to give whatever one asked, restraint was called for. As Athalya Brenner explains, 'up to half my kingdom' was 'a figure of speech born out of exaggerated good manners which is not to be taken seriously' (Brenner 1985: 31). The promise of Ahasuerus to Esther did not guarantee that he would welcome her request to do something as grandiose or as difficult (in terms of undoing a previous irrevocable decree) as sparing the Jews.

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banquet, at which Ahasuerus was required to grant boons. She faced the much more difficult task of trying to induce him to make a vow to give her anything she wanted. But first, before she could even attempt that uphill battle, she had to finagle a welcome into his presence, and even that was not going to be easy. In fact, it threatened to be deadly. Ancient audiences would have understood this intuitively. The book of Esther itself reflects the general view of women prevalent in the Persian Empire and in Ahasuerus's court. For instance... In 1.9, Queen Vashti gives a separate banquet for the women.21 Jon Levenson says that Vashti hosting her own party 'emphasizes the separation, perhaps even the incommensurability, of the worlds of the king and the queen' (Levenson 1997: 47). When Ahasuerus called for Vashti in 1.11, it was explicitly 'in order to display her beauty to the peoples and nobles, for she was lovely to look at'. Only Vashti's outward appearance was of interest to the king or the other men. 1.13-22 describes the reaction of Ahasuerus and the leading nobles to Vashti's refusal to appear for display.22 She was promptly banished (or killed). In 2.2, in order to take his mind off Vashti's absence, the king was encouraged to turn to new sexual diversions. This tells us something about Ahasuerus and something about the role and value of women in Persian society. 21. It is known from ancient sources that noble women did sometimes attend men' s banquets, although they would leave and be replaced by courtesans and prostitutes once the drinking began (Wyler 1995: 116). Perhaps the emphasis on drinking at this banquet precluded the women's attendance. 22. Many commentators view these verses as simply poking fun at Ahasuerus as a buffoon, and Clines and others have pointed out that his proclamation in fact drew more attention to Vashti's disobedience than it would otherwise have received (Clines 1984b: 33; Levenson 1997: 51). All of that is true, and it certainly is satisfyingly ironic that Ahasuerus proclaimed that 'every man should be ruler over his own household', when he had just demonstrated that he was incapable of doing precisely that. However, I think that a certain amount of truth lay in Memucan's words. Ancient Near Eastern cultures placed a pretty hefty emphasis on women's obedience to their husbands, and any substantial threat to that modus operandi was not to be dismissed lightly. One who represented an oppressed segment of the population and who publicly flaunted her disobedience could have been a very dangerous individual. Perhaps something public had to be done with Vashti. In any case, if nothing else, the king's decree showed how seriously the men in Persian society took their authority.

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In 2.2-3, the proposal to gather beautiful young virgins presents a picture in which the king could simply select and seize any virgins he pleased throughout his vast domain.23 The statement in 2.4, that 'this advice appealed to the king', is an example of wonderfully dry humor. It confirms the author's portrayal of Ahasuerus as a playboy dominated by lust, but understates it deliciously. The view of women behind this is obvious. Beginning in 2.10 and until ch. 7, Esther's ethnic background was kept secret. This seems to me to underscore the nature of her role as a pretty face and sex object only, whose nationality—Persian or otherwise—was so unimportant that it did not even need to be known. 2.12-14 outlines the preparation of girls for the king's bed. Kristen De Troyer has argued persuasively that the whole beauty preparation process was determined and implemented by men, who were the normgivers, and that the girls are pictured as simply the passive recipients of the treatments, who had no say whatsoever in the procedure (De Troyer 1995:49-56). The end of 2.14 seems to me to recount a tragedy. Girls were rounded up and deflowered by the king for his pleasure and his vanity, probably by the hundreds, according to Phipps's estimation (as cited by Wyler 1995: 119), and then they would linger, forgotten, in the harem for the rest of their lives. It is questionable whether any luxury or prestige they may have enjoyed there made up for their loss. This is not simply a question posed by modern readers' expectations of what types of happiness life ought to hold. In an ancient context the sense of tragedy was evident as well. In addition to the loss which the girls experienced, of their virginity and of any future sexual pleasure with the king or with any other man, one cannot escape the sense of bereavement of their families, who would never see the grandchildren that might have been theirs. The blessing of children, grandchildren and subsequent generations of descendants was of enormous importance in ancient cultures. The king's sexual indulgence represented a 'theft' of sorts, which affected the girls' families even into future generations.

23. Much speculation has been made about whether or not the virgins came to the king's harem willingly or under coercion. The rabbis who wrote the Talmud speculated that fathers hid their virgin daughters from the king (b. Meg. 12b). At the very least, it is clear that the king had the authority to implement such a gathering.

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In 2.17-18, we see the king holding the 'banquet of Esther' in order to show off his new acquisition to all his nobles and officials.24 In 5.1, Esther comes to the king rVO^ft ('royally').25 Whether the emphasis of the term niD^E is on her sexual appeal or on her royal position, it seems fairly clear that Esther's target was the king's pride in possessing a splendid queen. Esther desperately needed not only to win a welcome into the king's presence, but also to inspire in him such attraction, such abundance of favor, that he would accept her invitation to a banquet and there grant her sizeable request. Knowing Ahasuerus, she played to her strengths and to his weaknesses. In 7.3-4, when Esther finally made her petition and request known to the king, we again get a glimpse of a woman's role—even the queen's role— in the Persian court. The way she went about setting forth the request is tellingly artful. She could not simply spill the beans at the outset. If she did no more than state that her people had been threatened, her story would carry little weight. What was she but a woman, and who cared about her people? She had to first draw the king into the situation on her side by demonstrating that his honor had been affronted by the act of someone threatening her (and incidentally her people).26 This was not about her. It was all about him and his honor.27 Then, once the king was 24. Obviously it gratified him to show off not only a spectacularly beautiful wife, but an obedient one as well. One can sense the amusement of the author as he presented the king displaying his new trophy and being so puffed up with pride over it that he 'proclaimed a holiday throughout the provinces and distributed gifts with royal liberality'. When I dramatize this scene I portray the king swelling with pride of possession and strutting about like a peacock. Gestures of magnanimity such as are mentioned here are attested elsewhere in ancient literature—this is not unique—but that does not decrease the element of humor present in the text. 25. Bea Wyler notes that no translation can capture the precise meaning of this Hebrew word (Wyler 1995: 128). Some take it to mean 'in a queenly fashion', alluding to the authority and honor of her queenly position (so, for instance, Adele Berlin, as I learned from a conversation with her at Esther2000). The NIV, which is the translation I recite, translates it 'put on her royal robes'. My dramatic interpretation suggests that her royal robes were designed for sex appeal, which I view as the basis for her selection as queen. Note that this phrase recalls Vashti, who was to come to the king's party wearing her royal crown, in order to display her beauty. 26. See Timothy Laniak's excellent discussion of the honor/shame dynamics of this scene (Laniak 1998: 112-15). 27. Notice that Ahasuerus's fury subsided (7.10) once Haman was killed and his own honor was restored, even though the Jews were in as much danger as ever. His wrath had little or nothing to do with their plight (Jobes 1999: 176-77).

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good and upset over the insult to his honor represented by someone thinking they could threaten his queen, she had to name the problematic decree in such a way as to lay all the blame for it on Haman and none on the king.28 If she simply said, 'You made this terrible decree and I want you to change it', she herself would have dishonored him, and she would have been lost. Her opinion mattered nothing to him. Only if she could find a way for him to extricate himself from culpability in the issuance of the decree and redeem his honor by blaming Haman could she hope to gain the king's sympathy and action. The gender politics involved here are neither straightforward nor obvious to the modern mind, but are indicative of women's roles in Persia. In 9.29-10.3, Esther's role as a woman is somewhat ambiguous. Much has been written about Esther's transformation from the beginning to the end of the book. Some view her by ch. 9 as reigning as co-regent with Ahasuerus, equal to him in power and authority (Gitay 1995: 136-48). This seems unlikely to me. Esther grew much in the course of the story, but Ahasuerus remained largely unchanged. Only the objects of his favor changed. It would have required a change in him and in the societal system of Persia, rather than personal growth in Esther, to allow her to have occupied a position of such authority. Was Esther a powerful queen like Amestris and Parysatis? Perhaps not. However, in chs. 5 and 7 we do see her maneuvering her husband to maximize the chances that he would regard her with favor and perhaps grant her request to spare her people. In chs. 8 and 9 she persisted in her endeavor to obtain from the king deliverance for the Jews. 'Esther's decree' in 9.32, written with full authority, shows that she had indeed 'come a long way, baby', to borrow a phrase from a US tobacco commercial, from being just the beauty queen at 'Esther's banquet' of 2.18. As Jobes notes, 'Esther has to overcome two levels of conflict, both as a woman and as a Jew, to come into her own as Queen of Persia. We modern readers probably cannot fully appreciate how truly remarkable a feat that was' (Jobes 1999: 84). Ancient audiences, however, would have fully appreciated what Esther was up against, and that would have informed their understanding of 2.19a, a second gathering of virgins. Having considered the ancient Near Eastern view of women that both underlay and showed through the book of Esther, the question for our consideration remains: What was her standing or influence with Ahasuerus at the time she was called to go to him unbidden? Could she be confident 28. See Fox 1991a: 86; Laniak 1998: 115-16; Jobes 1999: 164-65.

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of a cordial reception? Or was she in danger and could she reasonably expect to die for her audacity? That is the question that must be answered in order to understand 2.19a. In light of the preceding argument, I believe Esther's standing in ch. 4 was precarious, which is why she legitimately feared for her life. But why was it precarious? The answer is found in numerous clues within the text itself. The first clue, of course, is the account of Vashti's fate in 1.19-20. She defied the king and was summarily dispatched into oblivion. The proclamation of the king and his nobles served to seal her doom and to reinforce the status quo. This set the stage and created the dramatic tension for Esther's contemplated defiance of the king's laws. Would she survive the ordeal any better than Vashti had? Vashti may or may not have actually been killed for her disobedience; the text does not say. But it does make clear that for the breaking of this law, which Esther was being called to transgress, the decreed penalty was death (4.11). The wry understatement of the author in 2.4, that the idea of rounding up all the gorgeous girls of the kingdom into his harem 'appealed to the king', informs the reader's picture of the king and of what was important to him where women were concerned. Esther's explanation of the golden scepter custom in 4.11 lays out in explicit detail the magnitude of the crime she was contemplating and the excruciatingly real danger she faced. While Vashti violated a general principle, that a woman must obey her husband, Esther was called upon to break a very specific law, one which was known to 'all the king's officials and the people of the royal provinces' (4.11). There would be no question that she had made a willful choice to defy him, and everyone would know it. We have already seen what happened to royal wives who publicly disgraced this king. Ahasuerus's sensitive pride, which had already suffered once because he could not show himself 'ruler over his own household', would not endure another such affront. He was not likely to be more lenient a second time, rather less so. If the counselors had had any trouble making Vashti's disobedience into a federal case on behalf of the king's wounded pride in ch. 1, there would be no difficulty in doing so this time. Therefore, if there was any scrap of reason for the king to be less than delighted with Esther, his offended pride would rule the day, and she would swiftly 'get the axe'.29 29. Josephus, in his account of this very event, claims that Artaxerxes (whom Josephus identifies with Ahasuerus) surrounded his throne with men bearing axes to

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Furthermore, this being the twelfth year of King Ahasuerus's reign (3.7), it had now been five years since Esther had been chosen as his queen (see 2.16). In five years a lot can happen to a man's interest in one particular woman. Ahasuerus had not exactly shown himself to be a paradigm of self-control and commitment. Levenson describes him as 'a spoiled playboy, a person who overindulges in physical pleasures and lacks a moral compass' (Levenson 1997: 46). Esther had become 'old hat'. She said as much when she pointed out to Hathach that 30 days had passed since she had been called to go to the king (4.11). The king's attraction to and interest in Esther had greatly waned. What were the chances that he would override the offense he would feel at her insubordination and hold out to her the gold scepter? Slim at best. Most likely, he would find himself thinking that it was time for a new queen who remembered how to obey.. .and who was still as young and beautiful as Esther had been five years ago.. .and would it not be fun to go through the selection process all over again? On top of this, Esther had been keeping a secret from the king. When she pled with the king for the Jews, it would obviously come out that she was Jewish. I have argued that the king probably did not particularly care what Esther's nationality was or he would have found it out earlier. But the fact that she deliberately hid it from him and everyone else might not impress him positively. All of these clues inform the reader about the agony of Esther's dilemma as she weighed Mordecai's words and decided whether or not to go to the king on behalf of her people. The chances of her coming out alive were marginal, and of receiving from the king the boon she hoped to ask even more so. It is far more likely that the king would welcome the excuse to do away with her and start again on the quest for a new wife. Everything in the text pushes in this direction. Jobes says, 'it seems likely that the ruthless King Xerxes will not extend the golden scepter if the queen's death would be somehow expedient to his other interests' (Jobes 1999: 132). It is precisely in the face of this grave danger that Esther's faith and courage are most vividly displayed. That Esther chose to put aside her own self-preservation and walk with open eyes into such danger in an almost hopeless effort to save her people makes her one of the remarkable

kill anyone who approached it without permission (Ant. 11.6.3). The inaccessibility of the Persian throne is referred to elsewhere too (Herodotus 1.99; 3.72, 77, 84, 118).

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heroines of the Jewish people.30 At the Esther2000 symposium I became aware of just how powerful a model Esther has been for Jews in subsequent generations and of the hope her courage has given them.31 In my opinion, 2.19a fits perfectly as one more stroke on the canvas that paints the picture of Esther's danger. Even without 2.19a, the king's enjoyment of the idea of rounding up virgins and the information that he had become bored with Esther has to raise the thought in audiences' minds that the king might enjoy harvesting a fresh crop of virgins. That possibility lurked in the background as Esther faced her danger. Should there be any wavering in the king's mind, it would take nothing for the appealing prospect of sampling a new batch of sweet young things to push him over the edge into a judgment against Esther. I propose that 2.19a sounded a note of impending doom by telling the audience that sometime in the five years between Esther's coronation and ch. 4, he had already done so. The double-taking had, in fact, already occurred. When the audience agonized with Esther in ch. 4, the memory of the information that had previously been supplied in 2.19a dissipated even the slim hope they had for Esther's survival. It moved the idea of Ahasuerus gathering a new crop of virgins out of the realm of theoretical speculation and placed it squarely before the audience as fact. It alluded to Ahasuerus having lost interest in Esther long ago. Already in the first years after her coronation, his affections and interests had moved on, and with or without a legitimate excuse he had sent out for a second crop of virgins to enjoy. Should she appear in his court unbidden in direct defiance of Persian law, the penalty for which was death, she would conveniently provide him with the perfect excuse to dispatch her and search for a new queen by gathering virgins a third time. From a dramatist's perspective, without 2.19a Esther's hope of receiving the gold scepter was minimal, and the agony of her decision to try, palpable. The information supplied in 2.19a that Ahasuerus had already so clearly moved on from his initial interest in Esther and that he so passionately enjoyed gathering and deflowering virgins, which her death would allow him to do yet again, effectively electrified Esther's agony and made the dramatic tension of the story almost unbearable. Far from being 'irrele-

30. As Lillian Klein says, 'This narrative tactic [the golden scepter] also allows the danger of Esther's mission to ennoble her' (Klein 1995: 163). 31. In fact, after listening to Michael Fox and others, I altered my dramatic presentation in places in an effort to reflect better the strength of Esther's resolve and the fortitude with which she pursued deliverance for her people.

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vant', as many have judged it, 2.19a was part and parcel of the development of this important theme. Having argued that 2.19a served the purpose of underscoring Esther's danger, one question remains: Why was the clause placed here? When I dramatize Esther, I deliver the line, 'At a second gathering of virgins', looking at the king's throne, with the cold anger and disgust of the Persian populace who had now been robbed of their daughters twice. Its placement in the text directly following the glowing account of Esther's coronation and banquet gives it a certain shock value. Its brevity does not allow the audience to dwell on the shock, merely to sit up in surprise and do a double take. 'Hold on—What? A second gathering of virgins? But... wait a minute...why?' And then the narration quickly moves on. The clause serves to shake the audience awake. The text does not allow its audience to become too comfortable for too long. All is not going to be smooth sailing ahead in the story. Just at this moment of glory and seeming triumph for the Jews, when the audience might be justifiably inclined to sit back and enjoy the wonder of a Jewess being the crowned queen of Persia, even to gloat a little, cold water is thrown in their faces. They had better not sit back because all is not as rosy as it seems. A similar thing happens between chs. 2 and 3. While the audience would like to revel in the fact that Mordecai has been able to save the king's life and will no doubt be suitably rewarded for it, they learn instead in the next verse that Ahasuerus has honored Haman—an Agagite, of all people! In its broadest outlines, the story of Esther gets darker and darker for the Jews until ch. 6, then brighter and brighter until the end. In the first half of the book, as the author sets the stage for, and then recounts, the tale of the Jews being borne helplessly toward destruction, these two events—Esther's coronation and Mordecai's successful abortion of the assassination attempt—are the only items that stand counter to that flow of the plot. Therefore, in each case, the author immediately undermines the hope that those events holds out to his audience. He placed 2.19a where it is in the flow of the narrative to snatch from his audience the hope of 'happily ever after' and to replace it with a sense of foreboding about the tenuous security of Esther and of the Jews. He refuses to let the audience relax, but keeps them shifting in their seats, wondering what further unpleasant surprises lie in store. This is a very effective dramatic technique. The placement of 2.19 after 2.17-18 (and of 3.1 after 2.23) makes solid

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dramatic sense and enhances the developing theme of the danger Esther faces when she approaches the king. Esther 2.19a has puzzled scholars for centuries because there is neither intra- nor extra-biblical evidence for a second gathering of virgins after Esther's and because it has seemed to many that this allusion to such a gathering serves no purpose and makes no sense within the story of Esther. As a dramatist, however, I believe it fits very well in the story—as it is and where it stands. I see no reason to despair over the clause HI Tim I Tim j*3pi"Q and no need to explain it away or dismiss it. In the vivid Persian tapestry the author weaves as a backdrop for this suspense-filled drama, 2.19a is a subtle but valuable thread. It catches the stage lights ever so briefly and just for a moment sends through the audience an electric tingle of dread. Esther 2.19a is perhaps not essential to the story line of the book, and might be missed by very few people if it were omitted. However, as a storyteller, I value its presence and appreciate the depth and color it lends to the tapestry of the text.

KOSHER ADULTERY? THE MORDECAI-ESTHER-AHASUERUS TRIANGLE IN TALMUDIC, MEDIEVAL AND SIXTEENTH-CENTURY EXEGESIS*

Barry D. Walfish

The book of Esther presented a challenge for Jewish religious leaders in the Second Temple and rabbinic periods. Its lack of religious sentiment, mention of religious practices or any reference to God raised serious questions about its suitability for inclusion in the biblical canon (Moore 1992: 636-39). Indeed it has been suggested by some that its unreligious nature is the very reason why a copy of the book has never been found among the Dead Sea Scrolls at Qumran.1 In order to make the book more religiously acceptable, authors of various communities undertook to rewrite it, making appropriate additions which make explicit God's intervening hand in orchestrating the events of the story, and present Mordecai and Esther as pious Jews who fast, pray and observe the commandments. This tendency is especially prevalent in the Greek versions of Esther, but is also manifest in various midrashic treatments of the story. Bearing in mind this tendency of the Sages to Judaize the Esther story, in this article I would like to deal with one remarkable aspect of the rabbinic treatment of Esther's union with Ahasuerus, which I believe has not received the attention it deserves—the tradition that Esther was married to Mordecai * I would like to thank Jacob Elbaum, Edward Greenstein, Eliezer Segal and Elliot Wolfson for their comments on earlier drafts of this essay. A different version of this essay appeared in Prooftexts 22 (2002): 305-33. 1. See Bronner 1995: 176 n. 3. But see Tov 1998: 289 n. 44, who believes this is just a coincidence. See also Talmon 1995: 249-68; Ben-Dov 1999: 282-84; and Finkel 1961: 163-82. These three authors offer linguistic evidence to show that authors of scrolls found at Qumran must have been familiar with the book of Esther. However, being familiar with the book and including it in one's library are separate matters. See also Crawford 1996a, who examines the relationship between the Aramaic fragments called 'Tales of the Persian Court' and the book of Esther, and concludes that the tales may have been a source for the author of Esther, but this is still not evidence for locating the book of Esther at Qumran.

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before being taken to the king's palace and becoming queen. After analyzing the rabbinic material surrounding this tradition, we will see how it was treated in the Middle Ages and beyond, focusing especially on two very different post-rabbinic treatments: those of Rashi, the famous eleventhcentury exegete, and Solomon ha-Levi Alkabetz, the sixteenth-century Safed kabbalist. One of the most troubling issues for the Sages was the idea that Esther, presumably a nice Jewish girl, married a gentile and had sexual relations with him.2 This was generally justified by the greater good that this act served. In order to fulfill God's plan to save his people, Esther had to be married to the king. Thus Rashi, in commenting on Est. 2.11, explains, 'Mordecai said that the only justification for this righteous woman to be taken to sleep with an idolater was that she would eventually rise up to save Israel. Therefore, he was pacing about [the courtyard] to find out what would happen with her in the end. '3 A late midrash states that Esther had been hiding herself; she was taken against her will and not for her own benefit.4 In other words, she was forced to marry and sleep with the king. The Zohar takes this idea to the extreme, claiming that the Shekhinah (divine presence) hid Esther from Ahasuerus and sent a spirit in her place while she returned to Mordecai,5 thereby intimating that she never actually slept with the king. In light of these expressions of uneasiness, there is one element of the rabbinic interpretation of the Esther story which is very puzzling. The 2. On this issue in the Middle Ages, see Walfish 1993: 122-26. Levenson 1997: 62 points out that no mention is made of Ahasuerus marrying Esther, suggesting that the author may have wished to play down this violation of Jewish law involved in marrying a non-Jew. This fact would probably have appealed to the Sages, who held that Esther was already married to Mordecai, as then the level of transgression involved is reduced. 3. So, Rashi portrays Mordecai as having prophetic powers, and as seeing events in cosmic terms as they related to the Jewish people. On Rashi's interpretation of Esther, see Kamin 1982: 547-58. 4. 'Aggadat 'Ester to 2.8. Abraham Ibn Ezra makes the same point in his second commentary, Va-Yosef 'Avraham. Cf. Gen. R. 52.3 (end) where a similar comment is made, that is, that Abraham said to Abimelech that Sarah was his sister 'against her will and not for her benefit'. In both cases there is a clear expression of discomfort with the situation. 5. Zohar (Ra'aya meheimna), Ki tese 276a. In light of the discussion on the relationship between Mordecai and Esther in the Talmud, perhaps the import of this passage needs to be reconsidered.

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rabbis in the Babylonian Talmud tractate Megillah, in the section referred to as the Babylonian Esther Midrash,6 portray Esther not as a young virgin, but as a mature woman who was already married to Mordecai when she was taken to the king's harem.7 This interpretation, far from smoothing over Esther's intermarriage, in fact raised the level of transgression from one of intercourse with a gentile to possible adultery. The rabbinic comments on this issue are found in the midrash on ch. 2. The chapter describes the course of events from the time following Vashti's deposition until Esther is chosen to be queen and comes to live with Ahasuerus in the royal palace. This chapter raises many difficulties, of a textual, narrational and religious nature. After introducing Mordecai in v. 6, the text introduces Esther in the following verse, 'He was the caregiver (]QN) for Hadassah—that is, Esther—his cousin [lit. his uncle's daughter], for she had neither father nor mother. The maiden was shapely and beautiful, and when her father and mother died, Mordecai took her for himself (17...nnp7) as a daughter This verse has several difficulties, the most obvious being the seemingly needless repetition of the information that Esther had no parents and that they were dead. The following midrash takes note of this, commenting, 'R. Pinhas and R. Kama Bar Guryon in the name of Rav: "Was she a foundling (PPpin^) that you say that she had no father or mother? But rather when her mother conceived her, her father died; and when she was born her mother died."' In other words, from the first statement one might have thought that she was a foundling and that her parents had abandoned her. Therefore the second statement is needed to clarify that her parents were both dead.8 6. It extends from b. Meg. 10b-l 7a. On this see the comprehensive three-volume commentary by Segal 1994. 7. Cf. Gen. R. 39.13, where different opinions are given regarding Esther's age, ranging from 40 to 80 years. A parallel is drawn between Abraham's age when he left his homeland and Esther's age (75) when she was taken to the king in preparation for her role in redeeming Israel. 8. Est. R. 6.5. Cf. b. Meg. 13a; Segal 1994, II: 47-48. Cf. Rashi on this verse in b. Meg. 13a: '"When her mother and father died": why is this necessary since it is already written that she had no father or mother? To teach us that she did not even have them for a day. Right after her mother conceived, her father died. Therefore, she did not have a father from the time that he was worthy of the name. Her mother died while giving birth to her and was not worthy of being called her mother.' Rashi makes no comment on this point in his Esther commentary. See also Midr. Teh. 22.23.

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The motif of Esther's orphaned state is used effectively for homiletical purposes in the following midrash: 'R. Berekhiah [said] in the name of R. Levi: The Blessed Holy One said to Israel: "You cried: 'We are orphans, without a father' [Lam. 5.3]; even so, the redeemer that I shall establish for you in Media will have neither father nor mother, as it is written: 'For she had neither father nor mother"" (Lam. R. 5.3). Thus, Esther's orphaned state is given cosmic historic significance as part of the divine plan for Israel's redemption. But it is the second half of the verse that generates the most surprising comments: A baraita teaches in the name of R. Meir, Do not read for his own 'daughter' (fQ^), but 'as a home' (HTlb). And thus does it say, 'But the poor man had nothing, save one little ewe-lamb, which he had bought. He tended it and it grew up together with him and his children. It would eat of his bread and drink from his cup and nestle in his bosom; it was like a daughter (flDD) to him. [2 Sam. 12.3]. (b. Meg. 13a)

The novelty of this comment is the reading of the word for 'daughter' (fD) as 'house' (rTD), which in rabbinic literature also means 'wife'.9 In other words, according to this midrash, Esther was already married to Mordecai before she was taken to Ahasuerus's palace. The basis for comparison is the use of the same word in the parable of the poor man's ewelamb, in which the ewe is compared to his daughter. Since the parable is alluding to Uriah and Bathsheba, the comparison is not so farfetched in that case. But what about in our case? It should be mentioned that this tradition is found only in the Babylonian Esther Midrash and its derivatives (Segal 1994, II: 51). But it is corroborated independently in the Septuagint (LXX), which reads 'as a wife' instead of 'as a daughter'. The presence of this tradition in the LXX, which dates from the third century BCE, suggests that it is indeed very ancient. Is this tradition as bizarre as it seems at first blush? Is there anything in the verse that would support such a comment? One detail is the use of the root Hp7 for Mordecai taking Esther as a daughter. This root is often used with the connotation of taking as a wife.10 L.B. Paton points out that the 9. The locus classicus is m. Yoma 1.1, commenting on Lev. 1 6.6. See also b. Yoma 2a, Sifra, 'Aharei mot 8.6, and many other midrashim. Cf. M.A. Friedman 1986: 80-8 1 n. 8; Segal 1994, II: 51 n. 97. 10. See the commentary 'Es Yosef on Est. R. ad loc, cited in Segal 1994, II: 49. Biblical examples include: Gen. 25.20; 28.6; Exod. 6.25; Judg. 14.3; 1 Sam. 25.42-43; 1 Kgs 4.15; Neh. 6.18; 1 Chron. 4.18; 2 Chron. 11.20. The first three cases are

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plain meaning of the text is that Mordecai and Esther are cousins and therefore could be of similar ages (Paton 1908: 171). There is also a redundancy in the verse, which refers to Mordecai as Esther's caregiver and then says that he took her for his daughter. '! This seems to beg for an explanation for the second phrase that would distinguish it from the first. Another important feature of the verse is the statement in the middle that 'the maiden was shapely and beautiful'. Of what relevance could this possibly be to Mordecai 's adoption of or caring for Esther? It seems to imply that her comeliness made her attractive to Mordecai as a mate.12 In other words, the verse could be stating that Mordecai cared for Esther when she was young, after her parents died. Presumably, when Esther had reached the age of puberty and had blossomed into an attractive young woman, Mordecai married her.13 This interpretation has been noted by many modern commentators, with varying degrees of approval.14 Few if any, however, have taken note of the fact that the story does not end here, but is carried on in b. Megillah, as well as in other sources, with rather surprising results. As if Mordecai being married to Esther before she was taken to the king's palace did not complicate matters enough, according to one opinion at least the sexual relationship between Esther and Mordecai continued even after she became queen. Commenting on Est. 2.20, 'For Esther did the command of especially suggestive as they use the combination of n p , 1 and ntDN. This point is also made by Gottlieb (1999: 52), who points out that the combination of Op1? with the direct object preceded by HN or as a suffix and two indirect objects preceded by -7 indicates the marriage relationship. This is exactly the situation we have in our verse. 1 1 . Of course, this could merely mean that he adopted her after her parents' deaths. 12. This has recently been pointed out by Beal 1999: 28. 13. In the Talmud, n~lU] refers to a young woman of marriageable age. See b. Qid. 41a: 'A man may give his daughter in betrothal when she is a maiden (n~IU3). Only when she is a maiden but not when she is a minor (HDEDp).' 14. Beal (1999: 28) is the most explicit, pointing out that the text appears to lean in this direction. Esther had no family, she was sexually attractive; when her parents died, Mordecai took her for himself as. . .daughter? One might well expect 'as wife' at this point. See also Levenson 1997: 31 n. 54, 58, and M.V. Fox 199 la: 30, 275-76. Fox points out that while the notion may reduce the sense of impropriety implied in Mordecai 's living with an unmarried girl under the same roof, it makes Esther's involvement with Ahasuerus tantamount to adultery. He also makes the interesting suggestion that underlying this translation/interpretation may be the practice of adoption/marriage which was common in the ancient Near East, whereby a man would adopt a girl with the intention of marrying her when she reached puberty. The Bible itself is silent on the topic of adoption.

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Mordecai just as when she was under his care', Rabbah bar Lima says in the name of Rav, 'She would stand up from the bosom of Ahasuerus, immerse herself, and sit down in the bosom of Mordecai' (b. Meg. 31b). Now this statement is sure to tax the ingenuity of even the most resourceful exegete.15 It is overtly sexual in tone, implying that Esther moved from bed to bed, cleansing herself in between. This scenario raises many ethical and halakhic problems and is difficult to justify in its context. The word pfl means 'bosom' and could have an erotic connotation, but it also appears in biblical texts in the context of parent-child relations. Indeed, this latter context would seem to be implied by the repetition of the word HHQN ('care') which alludes to ]Q8 in Est. 2.7. The mention of immersion, however, definitely places this verse in a sexual context (Segal 1994, II: 98). It almost seems as if Rabbah bar Lima understands JQK as having a sexual connotation, which would justify the association with v. 7 and the assumption of a prior sexual union between Mordecai and Esther. This interpretation, however, has no linguistic basis,16 and Rabbah bar Lima's provocative comment remains an unsolved enigma. Another question that needs to be asked in the context of this chapter is how a married Esther could be taken if the contestants all had to be virgins. The verse used to resolve this difficulty is Est. 2.17, 'The king loved Esther more than all the women and she won his grace and favor more than all the virgins'. The puzzling aspect of this verse is the mention of women (D^3), as well as virgins, which suggest the possibility that women other than virgins also participated in the competition. This point is mentioned in various midrashim, the most telling comment being attributed to R. Helbo: 'Said R. Helbo: "This teaches that he brought 15. Segal (1994, II: 88), comments that this statement 'remains enigmatic with regard to both its meaning and its relationship to the biblical verse'. 16. See on this passage Segal 1994, II: 90-91. Segal points out a similarity in formulation between this passage and a passage in b. Yeb. 108a. He suggests that Rabbah bar Lima is saying that there is no halakhic impediment preventing Esther from living with both Mordecai and Ahasuerus since the marriage to Ahasuerus (if there was one) is no more legally binding than that of a DDKQQ, a minor orphan, who can be given in a quasi-marriage which she is free to terminate at will. The purpose of the immersion in Yebamot is to allow a HDNftQ to eat the food of HQinn (heaveoffering, intended for priestly consumption). The implication in our passage is that Esther must cleanse herself of the defilement which has attached to her as a result of her having slept with a heathen. I am not certain it is incidental and secondary to the story, as Segal suggests (1994, II: 91 n. 358). The need to cleanse oneself after such an act must have felt very real to the Sages.

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before him married women as well, as it is written, 'more than all the women and all the virgins"".17 This verse, then, can be used to strengthen the argument of those who maintain that Esther was not a virgin and that she had a sexual relationship with Mordecai. The next reference to Esther's relationship with Mordecai and Ahasuerus is in the Babylonian Talmud's comment to 4.16, 'And so I will go to the king, which is not according to the law, and if I perish I perish'. 'What is "not according to the law?" Says R. Abba [bar Kahana].18 Which is not according to the law of every day. For on every day it is by compulsion, but today it is being done willingly' (b. Meg. 15a). In other words, Esther is telling Mordecai that up until now she had slept with Ahasuerus against her will, but now she would have to do it willingly and for this reason would be forbidden to him henceforth. The midrash continues, commenting on Esther's words, 'If I perish I perish' CTTDK Tm» "lOO,Est. 4.16) as follows, 'Just as I have perished from my family, so shall I perish from you'. In other words, this means the end of the relationship. The scenario as portrayed in the midrash is truly remarkable. Esther, who was married to Mordecai, is taken to Ahasuerus's palace to take part in a beauty contest. She wins the contest, becomes Ahasuerus's queen, has conjugal relations with him, though apparently unwillingly, and at the same time continues her relationship with Mordecai. This unusual arrangement is halakhically sanctioned because she is sleeping with Ahasuerus under duress. According to the halakhah, a woman who has involuntary relations with another man is not forbidden to her husband, although she must wait three months in between the two encounters in order to avoid confusion with regard to paternity. But now that she must go in again and offer herself to him of her own free will, she will be forbidden to Mordecai (Segal 1994, II: 257).

17. Panim 'Aherim B 33a (= 65); also in Abba Goryon lOa (= 19). Cf. Yalqut Shim 'oni 2.1056, where the wording is slightly different: 'they also brought him the wives of the men'. The statement in the Talmud (b. Meg. 13 a) at this point is less clear: 'Said Rav: "If he wanted to taste the taste of a virgin—he tasted it; the taste of a married [nbliO = 'sexually experienced'?] woman—he tasted that'". This would seem to imply that Esther had the ability to satisfy him in many ways—either with the innocent charm of a virgin, or in ways that only a more experienced woman would be able to do. 18. The words in brackets appear only in the Yemenite manuscript (which served as the basis for Segal's translation and commentary).

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In order to arrive at this understanding of Est. 4.16, the Sages have to do some very creative exegesis. According to the plain meaning of the verse and the subsequent verses in ch. 5, there is no allusion to sexual relations at this point in the story. Esther is merely going to plead with the king to save her people. But the word she uses to describe her approach is ('I will come') from the rootfcVQ,which in Biblical Hebrew often has a sexual connotation (usually, of a man entering a woman). Apparently, the Sage who made this comment understood that Esther's request to the king must be accompanied by a conjugal visit (Kamin 1982: 557). This is made explicit in the prayer that the Talmud attributes to Esther before she appears before the king. (The Sages, of course, could not imagine her acting in this life-threatening situation without first pouring out her heart in prayer.) The homilist puts Ps. 22.1 in her mouth, 'My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?'19 She continues, 'Lest you should judge the inadvertent deed as the intentional and an act done against one's will (DDIN) as an act performed willingly' (b. Meg. 15a). In other words, it is clear that she was intending to sleep with Ahasuerus of her own free will, presumably for the first time.20 The phrase 'which is not according to the law' (n"O $O "IIZJN) in its context applies to the law of the king, who forbade her to come without being summoned. But according to R. Abba this means, 'against the halakhah or Jewish law, which was willing to forgive involuntary relations with a gentile [that is, rape] but not voluntary ones'. So, now that Esther was transgressing the halakhah, she would be forbidden to Mordecai. In other words, only now would Esther actually be guilty of adultery. Until now, halakhically, she was engaged in an involuntary sexual relationship with the king, or, in other words, she was being raped regularly by him. Elsewhere, the Sages of the Talmud expressed concern for Esther's dilemma and wondered why she did not martyr herself for her faith and refuse to go to the king's palace:

19. This is the same prayer attributed to Jesus on the cross by Mt. 27.46. In fact, this entire chapter is read by the author of Midrash Tehillim from the standpoint of Esther. See now on this phenomenon, Menn 2000: 317-27. 20. Alternatively, one could read with Rashi that even though she is going to Ahasuerus of her own free will, she is compelled to act by circumstances beyond her control. But this reading does not jibe with the previous comment on which implies that now she is acting of her own free will and therefore will be forbidden to Mordecai.

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When Ravin came [from Palestine] R. Yohanan said: Even not during [the time of] an [oppressive] royal decree, they said only in private [could such an act be sanctioned and forgiven], but in public, even [if one is required to transgress] a minor commandment, he should submit himself to death and not transgress... Now Esther's case was public [and yet she submitted to an idolater and did not martyr herself]. To this Abbaye replied: Esther was like the ground [in other words, totally passive]. Rabbah said: [when they do it for] their own pleasure [and not for the purpose of denying the tenets of Judaism] it is different.21

According to Abbaye, then, if the intercourse with Ahasuerus was not consensual, then no transgression was involved. According to Rabbah, if the gentile is not committing the act in order to publicly scorn God and Judaism, martyrdom in order to protect the honor of God's name was not necessary. Esther must have been a very talented sexual partner in order to pull off such a ruse—to pretend to enjoy having sex with the king, and satisfying him like no other woman (Est. 2.17), while at the same time passively resisting.22 Perhaps the Sages had in mind that in this matter she must have had some help from above.23 It would seem that at this point the rabbinic subplot we have been following has come to an end. Now that Esther has agreed to have consensual sexual relations with Ahasuerus, she is forbidden to Mordecai and so cannot be with him in this way again. Indeed, there is no further reference to this relationship in the rabbinic commentary on the latter half of the book. (This is the reason for the question mark in the present article's title.) According to the strict halakhic interpretation, as forced as it may be, what went on between Esther and Ahasuerus was not adultery because it was non-consensual. Although the Sages do not comment, the aftermath of the story also contributes to the erotic potential of the relationship between Mordecai and Esther. We read in Est. 8.1-2, 'Mordecai presented

21. See b. Sank. 74a-b. This comment is based on the use of the passive of the verb np^, which indicated that Esther was taken against her will. 22. The rabbis state that she was passive (lit. 'like the ground', D^II? Up~lp) while engaging in the sex act, which does not make for a very enjoyable experience. See b. Sank. 74b. 23. According to one opinion in the Talmud, Esther was not even that beautiful, but had a sallow complexion (nrrn HpnpT), and won the contest only because of divine grace. See b. Meg. 13a. So too this grace must have continued to shine upon her during her relationship with the king.

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himself to the king, for Esther had revealed how he was related to her (il^1 Kin 11Q). The king slipped off his ring, which he had taken back from Haman, and gave it to Mordecai; and Esther put Mordecai in charge of Haman's property'. One might ask, what exactly did Esther tell Ahasuerus about her relationship to Mordecai? Conceivably, she told him about their blood relationship, but not about their marriage. Thus, Esther, true to her name, conceals even as she reveals, in keeping with the midrashic interpretation of her name, 'Why was she called Esther? Because she concealed her [private] matters'.24 One cannot help wonder what would have been going through the minds of these two lovers once they found themselves together again in the palace, in positions of power and with the opportunity to meet on a daily basis. Lancelot and Guinevere could not have asked for a better situation.25 In the last two chapters of the book, Esther and Mordecai are mentioned in the same breath several times, as in Est. 8.7, 9.29 and 9.31. These passages give clear evidence of their close relationship. This of course does not mean that they were having an affair. It does imply, however, that they had ample opportunity to be in close contact and opens up the possibility of a continuing relationship that was deeper than a filial one.26 But let us return to the rabbinic midrash. We must ask what could have been gained, morally, religiously or homiletically, from such a line of interpretation? As some have suggested, this situation would have heightened the miraculous nature of Esther's rise to power and influence. The more implausible the story, the easier it is to attribute it to divine providence. Another suggestion that has been made is that the story was introduced, along with the assertion that Esther was Mordecai's niece, to

24. B. Meg. 13a. Cf. Midr. Teh. 22.3: 'Esther means "the hidden one", for she remained hidden fast in her chambers'. 25. It is interesting to note that forms of the verb "Hi! appear at several critical points in the story: Esther was forbidden to reveal her identity (2.10); Mordecai told about Bigthan and Teresh (2.22); Haman was told that Mordecai was a Jew (3.4); Mordecai tells Esther of Haman's plot (4.7-8); and Esther reveals to Ahasuerus her connection to Mordecai (8.1). 26. Josephus seems to imply something along these lines, when he says in Ant. 11.295 that after the Jewish victory, Mordecai enjoyed the companionship of life (KOIVCOVIOCS TOU (3iov) with the queen. Segal (1991-92: 425 n. 26) suggests that Josephus may have been trying to soften the problematic tradition that would have had Esther married to two husbands. I would argue, on the contrary, that he may very well be alluding to this ancient tradition; otherwise, why mention it at all?

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provide halakhic justification for niece-marriage.271 find neither of these suggestions very convincing. There is too much drama and emotion invested in this story for it to be explained away by either of these suggestions. It just may be that the Sages saw here an opportunity to tell a good story and to add emotional impact and complexity to the Esther drama. This possibility brings us to the treatment of this story by exegetes in the Middle Ages and beyond. For the most part, exegetes, beginning with Rashi, and continuing on through the Middle Ages, used midrashic material very selectively in their commentaries. The school of Rashi was perhaps the most extreme in its avoidance of midrashim in its commentaries,28 but Ibn Ezra29 and others such as Ramban,30 David Qirnhi31 and Isaac Abarbanel32 also avoided difficult midrashim that had no textual foundation. While respect was shown for the Sages and their teachings, no compulsion was felt to relate to or justify their every word. In some cases, such as Isaac ben Yedaiah, (Saperstein 1980), Shemariah ben Elijah of Crete (Walfish 1993: 33-34) or Solomon ben Abraham ibn Adret (Horowitz 1987), attempts were made to interpret certain aggadot rationally. The latter also defended aggadot which were the object of attacks by Christians, and in a few cases offered kabbalistic interpretations of obscure aggadot (Horowitz 1987: 15-25). It is not surprising, then, that for the most part the Esther-Mordecai marriage motif was ignored in the Middle Ages.33 Those that did make note of it, such as Abraham Ibn Ezra, tried to explain it away. For Ibn Ezra, it was inconceivable that Esther was not a virgin, for why would Mordecai wish to rely on a miracle by sending a non-virgin to appear before the king (and, presumably, miraculously demonstrate her virginity). He suggests 27. See Segal 1994, II: 51-52, especially n. 104, which gives sources for the Esther-niece tradition. See also Segal 1991-92: 425-29, for a fuller treatment of this issue. 28. On Rashbam's rejection of rabbinic interpretations, for example, see Berger 1992:21-40. 29. On Ibn Ezra's use of rabbinic material, see Walfish 1989. 30. On the attitude of Nahmanides, see Marvin Fox 1989; see also Septimus 1983. Though a kabbalist, Nahmanides did not accept the absolute authority of all aggadah, although he did recognize the general binding character of rabbinic teachings, 31. On Qimhi's attitude to midrash, see Talmage 1975: 83-134. 32. On Abarbanel's attitude to midrashim, see now Lawee 1996. 33. A survey of the corpus of medieval commentaries on the book turned up very little. Aside from Rashi and Ibn Ezra, this motif was virtually ignored. For a survey of the treatment of midrashim on Esther in medieval exegesis, see Walfish 1993: 25-36.

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that perhaps it was his intention, because of her beauty, to take her as a wife when she was older. This interpretation is taken up by later exegetes, but Ibn Ezra and most others, like the exegetes of our own generation, do not engage with the rest of the midrashic treatment of this story. For most exegetes trying to understand the narrative and explain it in its context, this whole scenario must have seemed quite farfetched. It is indeed noteworthy then that Rashi, arguably the most prominent medieval exegete, does pick up this thread. He follows it consistently, basing himself for the most part on the appropriate passages from the Babylonian Esther Midrash.3^ Now, as is well known, Rashi is very careful in his choice of rabbinic material.35 Indeed, Edward Greenstein has argued convincingly that, 'each and every use ofderash' by Rashi 'that is of an aggadic (nonhalakhic) nature can be understood as an effort to account for the specific language and rhetoric of the text' (Greenstein 1993: 56). Therefore, his inclusion of this interpretation in his commentary lends credence to the assertion that there is an exegetical, linguistic justification for interpreting HD1? in Est. 2.7 as 'wife'.36 Sarah Kamin has dealt with Rashi's treatment of this issue in her article on Rashi's commentary on Esther (Kamin 1982). She discusses the three places where Rashi follows this line in his commentary: at Est. 2.7, 2.17 and 4.16. According to Kamin: It is difficult to explain this as necessarily deriving from difficulties in the text or from the very existence of the midrashim themselves, since Rashi does not cite every midrashic comment. It seems that this matter serves Rashi paradoxically to stress God's intervention in the seemingly natural course of events, by removing this course from the realm of the 'natural'. If God's salvation was brought about by a righteous married woman, this could not have been a chance occurrence, and it is impossible to explain it as a result of her beauty alone. (Kamin 1982: 556)

I am not entirely convinced by Kamin's reasoning. Elsewhere Kamin mentions Rashi's commitment to maintaining the narrative integrity of the text. This is the overriding principle that guides Rashi in the selection and 34. According to Abraham Berliner, an editor of Rashi's Torah commentary, Rashi gave preference to Babylonian Talmud traditions, which he must have considered to be more authoritative. This opinion goes back at least to Rav Hai Gaon (Jacob Elbaum, personal communication). 35. Much has been written on Rashi's relation to his midrashic sources; see, e.g., Leibowitz 1970; Gelles 1981; Kamin 1986; Rahaman 1991. 36. In the verses preceding and following he dismisses rabbinic statements with the remark, 'and our Sages interpreted after their fashion'. On Rashi's use of midrash in his Esther commentary, see Walfish 1993: 26-31.

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adaptation of the midrashim that he incorporates in his commentary.37 It does not seem necessary to postulate that Esther was already married in order to stress the miraculous nature of the entire course of events in the Esther story. There is enough room for divine intervention in directing events behind the scenes without adding this unlikely twist to the story. However, once Rashi adopted the rabbinic interpretation that Esther was married to Mordecai based on the reading of daughter (TO) as wife in Est. 2.7, he must have felt obliged to follow this line of interpretation throughout. This would suggest that Rashi saw an exegetical problem in Est. 2.7 that this interpretation addressed. The exegetical problems in the verse have already been mentioned: the fact that the text clearly states that Mordecai and Esther were cousins, the mention of her beauty in the middle of the verse and the use of the verb FIp^. These all lend support to the Esther/wife proposition. At 2.17, the mention of women as well as virgins is a real puzzle. Rashi comments, '"More than all the women": the married ones since he also gathered married women'. Rashi must have felt this crux needed treatment and accepted the midrashic explanation as the most reasonable. If women and virgins are mentioned in the same verse, the king must have tried out married women as well. In this way, Esther's marriage to Mordecai gets some indirect support from the text. It is significant that Rashi does not use the talmudic midrash at this point, probably because it was not explicit enough. Rather, he found a more suitable comment in Midrash Panim 'Aherim which expresses the matter more explicitly: 'R. Helbo said, "This teaches that he also brought [married] women (niNI^U) before him, as it is written, 'more than all the married women and more than all the virgins'"',38 Rashi felt free to choose and to tailor his rabbinic sources to suit his exegetical needs. It is interesting to note that Rashi ignores the most astounding midrashic comment in our corpus, that of Rabbah bar Lima in the name of Rav, that Esther would get up from Ahasuerus's bosom, immerse herself and then 37. Kamin 1982: 548. See especially Rashi's introduction to his Song of Songs commentary, where he complains that the rabbinic midrashim on the book cannot be reconciled with the language of the text and the order of the verses. Michael A. Signer has devoted several studies to exploring this aspect of Rashi's exegesis; see Signer 1993; 1997:103-10; 2002. 38. It is possible that Rashi's comment uses elements from both sources, since he uses m'niQ ('non-virgins'), which is the plural of nbllQ, the word found in the talmudic comment at this point. Midrash Panim 'Aherim uses mNICO ('married women').

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go and lie in Mordecai's bosom. In all likelihood Rashi does not include this comment because it is too far removed from the narrative and cannot find any exegetical justification. It is clear, however, that he had no trouble accepting this tradition, for he comments on it in his Talmud commentary, 'And she immerses herself: "for reasons of cleanliness, so that she would not be repulsive to the righteous [Mordecai] after having slept with Ahasuerus"'.39 In his exegesis of Est. 4.16, Rashi explains each section according to the context, but then adds the midrashic interpretation: Which is against the law: it is against the law for one who has not been called to enter. According to a midrash aggadah: until now by force, now willingly. If I perish I perish: just as I have begun to perish, I will continue until I die. A midrash aggadah: just as I was lost to my father's house, so will I be lost to you, since now that 1 am willingly going to Ahasuerus to sleep with him, I will be forbidden to you.

Apparently Rashi chose to follow this line of interpretation because he had started it at Est. 2.7 and because these comments fit together into a narrative framework which adds another dimension to the story.40 Not only do we have the drama of Esther appearing before Ahasuerus and putting her life in danger in order to save her people, but we are also faced with the poignant scene of Esther having to sever intimate relations with Mordecai, her true love, to whom she had been faithful even while living with the king.41 39. B. Meg. 13b, Rashi ad loc. It is interesting to note that Tosafot at this point suggest that Esther used birth control (a ~[1Q or sponge) in order to avoid the issue of questionable paternity of any resultant offspring. These rabbis as well seemed to have accepted this situation. 40. Of course, it must be stressed that in each case there is an exegetical reason why the peshat explanation is not adequate and needs to be supplemented by the derash in order to do the verse justice. In the first part of the verse, the law that Esther would be transgressing is not made explicit, so this leaves room for several interpretations. Perhaps one can also see here a resonance of Est. 1.8, 'the drinking was according to law; there was no compulsion'. Perhaps in the case of drinking there was no compulsion, but here, in the case of Esther, there was. In the second comment, perhaps Rashi was not completely satisfied with his first comment, which does not do full justice to the repetition of the word TTQN. The midrash does a better job. 41. It is never made explicit that they were actually married, although this would have been the expectation. Levenson (1997: 62) suggests that marital terminology is avoided in order to play down the violation of Jewish law that Esther's marriage to a non-Jew entailed.

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I would argue, therefore, that it is not so much the unnaturalness of the events portrayed in the midrash which drew Rashi to this line of interpretation but rather the narrative imperative—the fact that these midrashim form a compelling narrative which adds drama, emotion and poignancy to the story. The sixteenth century witnessed a veritable explosion in the field of homiletics, especially in the East, among the communities of Sephardim exiled from Spain, and newly established in Constantinople, Saloniki and other centers (Hacker 1987). It was the practice to preach every sabbath on the weekly Torah reading. The homiletic style required the preacher to cite a passage from Scripture and then a relevant midrashic interpretation. This made the resort to rabbinic midrash a much more common occurrence. When these homilists came to gather their sermons together and publish them, we find that their works incorporate a wealth of rabbinic midrash. Indeed, according to Joseph Hacker, talmudic non-halakhic material was not merely window dressing to embellish the sermon or to buttress a contemporary opinion. Rather, the elucidation of the midrash or rabbinic maxim eventually became the main object of the lesson (Hacker 1987: 115). In the case of Esther, it was probably the custom to deliver a discourse on the scroll on the sabbath before Purim. After several years of preaching, homilists would gather their sermons and publish them as books. Commentaries on Esther of a homiletical nature proliferated in this period, with as many commentaries appearing in the sixteenth century as in all the preceding centuries. All of them quote extensively from rabbinic sources, especially the Esther midrash in the Babylonian Talmud. Among the commentaries that deal with the issue under discussion to a greater or lesser degree may be mentioned those of Moses Alsheikh,42 Meir Arama,43

42. Mas 'at Mosheh. Alsheikh mentions the marriage of Esther to Mordecai but does not discuss it extensively. He does deal with Rabbah bar Lima's statement (in his comment at Est. 2.20) and tries to justify it by finding a basis for it in the text. He sees the use of the active n27IU ['she did'] as an indication that something more than passive obedience was involved here. Just as Esther would bring him her menstrual blood to check while she was living with him, so she did now. Cf. Alkabetz ad loc. 43. Printed in Arama 1849. The commentary is attibuted to Isaac but is really that of his son, Meir (Walfish 1993: 226). Arama seems to prefer the position that Esther was a virgin. He refers to the Sages' opinion as a derash (T'T~I "lETlTl, 'our Sages explained') and explains, as did others, that she must have been betrothed to him. He also refers to the Sages' opinion that since Esther was called 'woman', 'daughter' and 'virgin', that she could take on the qualities of either when the need arose, so that she

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Elisha Galileo,44 Joseph Ibn Yahya,45 Samuel Uceda and Yom Tov Tzahalon. There were also some who ignored it or rejected it.46 Samuel b. Isaac Uceda (b. 1540), a prominent member of the Safed school of kabbalists, was a well-known homilist and talmudist of the late sixteenth century. Uceda is clearly uncomfortable with R. Meir's daughter/ wife midrash and comments, It is necessary to understand who forced him to take this verse out of its literal meaning, since the peshat of the verse gives to understand that their relationship was like one of father and daughter. Furthermore, it is impossible that she was his wife, for then how could she have been taken to the palace as a virgin, having already had relations with Mordecai. (Uceda 1996:74-75)

could satisfy the king in a variety of ways (cf. b. Meg. 13a). He makes no further reference to this issue. 44. Perush Megillat 'Ester 28a on Est. 2.7. Gallico at first seems to favor the peshat (contextual) reading of the verse, since the king's men were looking for virgins, and it was possible that even if Mordecai had intended to marry her, he did not manage to do so before she was taken by the king's men. But he then rejects this line, because it conflicts with the saying of Rabbah bar Lima in the name of Rav (which he refers to generically as the Sages' saying [V'T D~1QNQ]) that she would go from Ahasuerus's bed to Mordecai's. He resolves this question to his satisfaction by quoting the targum which focuses on the seemingly superfluous word I1? ('to him' [see above]) which indicates to him that marriage was implied here, and out of affection he called her 'daughter'. This misled Ahasuerus's men, according to Gallico, who finds this explanation adequate. Again, what is significant here is Gallico's unwillingness to ignore Rabbah bar Lima's statement and his attempt to reconcile it with the peshat of the text. 45. See Ibn Yahya 1996: 13. According to Ibn Yahya: 'And as our Sages, of blessed memory [said]: Do not read for a daughter but rather for a wife, which means to say, because she was an orphan, with no father or mother, and there was no one to watch over her and take pity on her, Mordecai agreed to take her for his wife. For he had the right of redemption and there was no redeemer beside him, especially since she was perfect and beautiful.' 46. E.g. Eliezer Ashkenazi and Moses Almosnino. At Est. 2.7, Ashkenazi in his commentary, YosefLeqah, comments that Mordecai distanced himself from Esther (sexually) as he would from a daughter and 'even if the Sages explained PQ^ as this is a midrash, but the peshat of the verse could be the way I explained it'. At Est. 2.7, Almosnino comments, 'He was wondering whether to marry her (no one would object since she had no mother or father), but nevertheless, decided to take her as a daughter; and she was a virgin and he did not touch her, and the impulse to have relations with her did not overcome him. This shows his extraordinary piety and perfection'.

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He concludes that a miracle occurred in this case, as alluded to by the Sages, and she retained her virginal qualities; when she had intercourse with Ahasuerus, blood flowed from her like from a virgin. He does qualify his statement by saying that we need to explain the verse this way only if we admit that Mordecai and Esther were actually married (Uceda 1996: 74-75). Uceda also refers to the statement by Rabbah bar Lima in the name of Rav and attempts to explain the difference of opinion between them, although in my opinion he does not succeed in explaining Rav's statement.47 Yom Tov Tzahalon also devotes a great deal of effort to explicating this crux in his commentary Leqah tov, which he published at the age of 18 (Venice, 1577). He asks why the verse cannot be taken literally, since Mordecai treated her as his daughter. Furthermore, how can it be explained that she was taken to the king if she were not a virgin? One explanation he offers focuses on the differences in wording in Est. 2.2-3 and 2.4. In the first two verses, the king's servants specify virgin maidens niTirQ), but in 2.4 it says, 'and the maiden that pleases the king will reign in place of Vashti', implying that virginity was not an absolute requirement, since she was replacing Vashti. Another interpretation he offers is that Mordecai took her with the intention of marrying her when she was older.48 Finally, he perceptively focuses on the awkwardness of the construction nih "P !~inp A He suggests that if adoption were the sense of the text, then either rch is superfluous, or the text should have read PQ3 ('as a daughter'). Since it says rch, marriage seems to make the most sense. Still he admits that he has trouble justifying the need for the Sages to explain the text this way (Tzahalon 1977: 21b-22a). Tzahalon also develops a very detailed and convoluted explanation of the talmudic statements of Rabbi Yirmiyah (which he attributes to Rabbi Hanina) and Rabbah bar Lima in the name of Rav (which he attributes to Abba bar Lima) concerning her showing her menstrual blood to the Sages and moving from Ahasuerus's bed to that of Mordecai after immersing herself (Tzahalon 1977: 30a-31a), showing how the two statements are connected. 47. See Uceda 1996:94,169, where he explains "rTQK TmK "IICKD according to the interpretation of the Sages, that as she had lost part of her time with Mordecai, in that she could not be with him by day, now she would be completely forbidden to him. 48. He also offers a different take on HQN1 rT3K mQITI ('when her father and mother died'), which he suggests could be read: 'because of the death of her father and mother'.

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Yom TOY'S commentary devotes a great deal of space to elucidating the midrashic reading in the Talmud in a very systematic way. The author obviously accepts the talmudic statements, but feels free to ask difficult questions and to express reservations with certain opinions when this seems necessary. A different attitude is displayed by the exegetes in the school of Joseph Taitatzak of Saloniki and later of Safed. According to the view of this school, the words of the Sages were true and their interpretations of the biblical text reflect reliable traditions which they had received and which therefore could not be ignored or dismissed.49 A representative and perhaps radical member of this group of exegetes was Solomon ben Moses ha-Levi Alkabetz (c. 1500-76). Early in his career, this exegete and kabbalist wrote an encyclopedic commentary on Esther entitled Menot haLevi.50 In this commentary,51 Alkabetz quotes midrashic sources extensively, apparently out of a strong conviction that they are true and accurate parts of the story that were not recorded by Esther and Mordecai.52 This strongly held opinion of Alkabetz can explain why he felt compelled to deal with the talmudic passage here under discussion, despite the extreme discomfort it caused him. In the following passage, he gives expression to this discomfort: Indeed, for days and years I have sat stupefied and trembling over how the Sages could have said such a thing, and they established and accepted it everywhere to the extent that they even said that after she was taken to the king's palace and the king married her and crowned her queen instead of Vashti that she would leave Ahasuerus's bosom, immerse herself and sit in Mordecai's bosom, as it was stated in the verse 49. See Shalem 1 966: 121. See also the recently published book by Jacob Elbaum, which deals extensively with the medieval attitudes to rabbinic aggadah. One group which Elbaum identifies is called 'the preservationists' (D^HQE?), those that defended the literal meaning of the Sages' words and accepted them at face value. One representative he cites is Joseph Ashkenazi, a contemporary of Alkabetz. See Elbaum 2000: 225-51. 50. The first edition of the commentary was completed in 1529, and given to his future father-in-law as a Purim gift (see Alkabetz 1996, I: 1). He later added more material, for example, quotations from the commentary of Judah ibn Shoshan, but did not complete a second edition (p. 14). His son Moses added material and the book was completed by R. Mordekhai ben Barukh of Tivoli. See Shalem 1966: 130-31. The book was first published in Venice in 1585. 51. It should be noted that while Alkabetz does not cite kabbalistic sources extensively in this commentary, his kabbalistic orientation still stands out. See below. 52. On this matter, see Shalem 1966: 121, and further below.

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[2.20]. Now this is a very strange thing, and many important and distinguished Jews ignored it [1DQI3 D'DS TTnDH, lit. 'hid their faces from it'] and some went so far as to deny it, and the most fastidious among them said she was only engaged to Mordecai,53 after the Sages had said she was his wife, and that he had not had the opportunity to marry her before she was taken away to the king's palace. I, in my poverty, will always hold on to the fringes of the garment of our holy Sages and will not veer from their words to the right or to the left, but these words that they said are difficult for me, even more so because they emend the text to say such a thing, strange and foreign as it is, and they say do not read rch but rPDb. But my heart tells me that anything that has come from their holy mouths, as strange as it may be, can be verified, for all of their utterances are without corruption, and God saw my affliction and has illumined my eyes on this matter to know and to make known the truth of their words.554

Alkabetz, in keeping with his commitment to upholding the integrity of the words of the Sages, manages to produce a detailed defense of the rabbinic tradition, the main points of which are the following: 1. The Sages arrived at their opinion through logical deduction and an understanding of the verses. 2. According to a midrash in Genesis Kabbah, Esther was 75 years old (the gematria of 'Hadassah').55 3. In b. Sank. 73a, it is written concerning Lev. 19.29: 'Do not profane your daughter to cause her to be promiscuous: R. Eliezer says, "This is someone who marries someone much older than herself; R. Akiva says, "This is someone who leaves his mature daughter [unmarried]'". From all this Alkabetz concludes that Mordecai could not have left Esther unmarried for so many years because he would have transgressed the verse in Leviticus. Therefore the Sages read r\lh as 53. E.g. Ibn Ezra (see above). 54. Alkabetz 1996,1: 243. For a slightly different partial translation of this passage, see Segal 1994, II: 89 n. 350. It is interesting to note that Alkabetz is so upset about this midrashic tradition, but does not seem to be nearly as exercised over the tradition he cites on the previous page that Mordecai nursed Esther when he was raising her. See Alkabetz 1996, I: 242. The comment is based on the word ~H being written with defective spelling, which can then be read as 11_ ('breast'). Perhaps the moral implications of the Esther-as-wife tradition were just too much for him. Cf. Gen. R. 30.8, where Mordecai's nursing of Esther is also referred to. 55. See Gen. R. 12.4. It is necessary to add 'one' (called the kolel) to make the gematria work. See Eleazar ben Judah of Worms 1980: 16; also cited in Alkabetz 1996,1: 244.

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6. 7. 8. 9.

He explains nnp1? ('he took her') as referring to marriage. The appellation !T")I?3 for Esther is not unusual for older women; cf. Joshua, who is referred to as "I^D (Exod. 33.11), even though he was obviously a grown man. In no place in the scroll is Esther called a 'virgin'.56 The word 1^ ('to him') is also an allusion to marriage. Ahasuerus tried out married women as well as virgins, as we see inEst. 2.17. The story of the poor man's ewe-lamb also alludes to J~Q as wife. Indeed, why would a man relate to a lamb as a daughter? 'Wife' makes more sense.

At Est. 2.20 (Alkabetz 1996,1: 307) Alkabetz quotes the remarkable statement of Rabbah bar Lima in the name of Rav concerning Esther's moving from Ahasuerus's bed, immersing and proceeding to Mordecai's, as well as the opinions of Rashi and Tosafot on the matter. He then quotes the following comment of R. Judah ibn Shoshan, a contemporary:57 As to their saying that she would show her [menstrual] blood to the Sages, it would seem that she would do this not to avoid having relations with the king, since she was being forced; if, then, she had relations with him while she was menstruating, what difference would it make to her? Rather, she would do this for the benefit of her husband Mordecai, so that she would be completely ritually pure during her clean days. This contradicts Rashi's statement that she immersed herself for reasons of cleanliness. It seems from his words that she did not have relations with the king while she was menstruating. It is possible that also our Rabbi [Rashi], may his memory be blessed, admits that she had relations with him while menstruating, but that the authors of the gemara did not have to say that she immersed herself for the benefit of her Jewish husband, but to inform us that also when she was pure she would immerse herself [after relations with Ahasuerus] out of disgust at having lain with a gentile. Many will wonder how they would endanger themselves and put their lives in peril and scorn the royal office, since this is a false virtue (HIE niTiW mft). But I say that it was proper for Esther to prepare herself for her husband Mordecai as much as possible in order to show him that she was steadfast in her Judaism and did not want to transgress a commandment, and he too supported her and strengthened her at frequent intervals for she was part of him... but neither she nor he

56. Cf. Gen. 24.16, where Rebecca is referred to both as a maiden (mUD) and a virgin (H^irO). 57. Apparently his comments were not included in the first edition, but were added by the author in a subsequent recension.

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revealed the nature of their relationship. He had a key to get into her quarters, and if he would have separated from her, perhaps she would have despaired of the Jewish people...but now relations with a gentile were of secondary importance to her. We need [this explanation] since a tanna [a Sage of the Mishnah] and an amora [a Sage of the Talmud] agreed on this point and no one disputed it, for Mordecai was used to endangering himself for the sake of his faith. Furthermore, anyone who opens his mouth against a clear talmudic statement is following the ways of the politicians and loses the perfection which is found in it ; furthermore, Esther was raped by the king and the rapist acted improperly.

There are several points worth noting in Ibn Shoshan's rather lengthy, pilpulistic comment: (1) he raises the possibility that Esther would have slept with the king while a menstruant. This possibility is ultimately rejected. (2) Ibn Shoshan clearly recognizes Mordecai and Esther as a married couple. (3) He tries to imagine how Esther and Mordecai could have pulled off the ruse and concludes that it would have been possible for Mordecai to have access to her chambers without arousing suspicions. (4) He sees the continuing relationship with Mordecai as necessary for maintaining and strengthening Esther's Jewish identity. This is an intriguing comment that perhaps derives from an environment of crypto-Judaism, such as would have been common in Spain and Portugal in the sixteenth century and still familiar to the exiled communities in the East. (5) Ibn Shoshan expresses himself forcefully about the need to defend the inviolability of talmudic statements, a position also held by Alkabetz. In response to Ibn Shoshan, Alkabetz comments that it is inconceivable that Esther would have had relations with Ahasuerus while a menstruant, since this would have contravened an explicit law in the Torah. Rather, she immersed after relations with him, even when she was ritually clean, out of disgust. Furthermore, the comments of the Sages that Mordecai would 'walk about in front of the court of the harem' (Est. 2.11) 'in order to inquire about her stain and her menstrual flow' , Est. R. 6.8) and that 'Esther would show her menstrual blood to the Sages' (b. Meg. 13b on Est. 2.20) demonstrate that she was as careful as possible and that she would immerse after having relations with both Ahasuerus and Mordecai. He further explains that the Sages must have seen a superfluity in Est. 2.20 that needed to be addressed (after v. 10) and this explains the need for the comments of Rabbi Jeremiah and Rabbah bar Lima in the name of Rav in the Talmud (b. Meg. 13b).

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Alkabetz saves his strongest words for a spirited defence of the integrity of the Sages: And I say 'may the lips speaking falsehood be silenced' [Ps. 31.19], they should be bound, made dumb and silenced,58 because they utter falsehood against the righteous of the earth (D^II? 'p'HiJ) with pride and arrogance... and as for what the above-mentioned Sage [Judah Ibn Shoshan] said that they follow the ways of politicians I say that they will end up following false opinions and heresies and whoever says 'this saying is pleasant, this one is not' is a companion of harlots [Ps. 29.3]59 as it is written in the Talmud, (b. 'Erub. 64a [see Alkabetz 1996,1: 310])

We see here that, for Alkabetz, the Sages' comments on the text are as valid as the text itself and are seen as an integral part of it and as absolutely necessary for its proper understanding. He states this position even more clearly and forcefully in the following passage: 'Still more am I amazed at them and their like. Who gave them permission to make light of the words of the Sages, and who gave them the power to choose and say this aggadic statement is pleasant and this one is not?' (Alkabetz 1996,1: 404). He then quotes the following statement from Midrash Leqah tov on Est. 9.29: 'Esther wrote with full authority (^plH): the essence of the story alone was written, but most of the events that occurred at that time were not written, such as the aggadot in Midrash Megillat Ester' (ben Eliezer 1886:111). He also quotes Eleazar ben Judah of Worms to the same effect: 'They undertook and obligated themselves [Est. 9.27] to mention the power of the miracle and of Esther, as it is written "with full authority", and in the end they obligated themselves to expound on the scroll for the midrash is as essential as the words of the Torah' (ben Judah 1980: 78). Alkabetz concludes his discourse on this point with a quote from the Jerusalem Talmud to the effect that the scroll of Esther is like the Five Books of Moses which are never to be abrogated. If this is so, then it is only proper that its status should be the same as that of the Torah for purposes of midrash (homily) and practice and one should preach from it itself and from the words of the Sages, and when one's reason differs with their words, their words take precedence (Alkabetz 1996: 404). We see then that the position Alkabetz takes has medieval precedents, and it likely reflects an Ashkenazic-Palestinian tradition which was trans-

58. SGQGen.R. 1.5. 59. There is a play of words here in the Hebrew: H]1T is 'harlot', which sounds like HK3 IT ('this is pleasant') in the phrase PIN] IT nuiQtD ('this saying is pleasant').

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mitted in certain circles down through the Middle Ages.60 It emerged forcefully in Alkabetz for a variety of reasons, among them the needs of the homilist and the attitude of the mystic to the words of the Sages. Although some of the other exegetes discussed here, such as Samuel Uceda and Yom Tov Tzahalon, were kabbalists, they do not introduce mystical ideas into their commentaries, at least not in connection with the theme here under discussion. This is not the case for Alkabetz, for whom the union of Mordecai and Esther had mystical significance. For instance, in his introduction we find the following statement, 'With this, it is possible to understand the reason why the scroll is rolled as one column. This is to teach that all this was fulfilled on [the strength] of one pillar ["column", 11 EJJ], and his name is sadiq, for his name was called Mordecai the righteous (|T "[!£), and he cleaves to Esther his mate, and the wise will understand (]'T V'DKDn)'. 61 Elsewhere, at Est. 4.16 (Alkabetz 1996, II: 66), after quoting the Talmud and Rashi on this verse (see above), he comments 'From this one can see what a great mystery ("IHD "Q~l) is inherent in the union of these two righteous people, Mordecai and Esther, to the point that she is bitterly disappointed that she will be lost to him'. Finally, at Est. 2.20, comes the most revealing statement: for both he and she [Mordecai and Esther] had holy intentions D^lTOnQ) even more so for someone who was privileged to stand in the circle of God's initiates (DCH 11D) to know and understand the matter of Mordecai and Esther, the righteous ones, and that their union and coupling is a lamp unto God and something worthy and necessary in order to bring about the redemption of Israel, and this was something worth risking their lives for. Furthermore, Mordecai the righteous was a great wise man, adept in the use of the Tetragrammaton (CHISftn DC1), and he could go out and come in without anyone seeing him; this can be found in the Ra'aya meheimna ... If you understand this matter you will realize that Tosafot troubled themselves in vain over the problem of why Mordecai did not divorce her, for if he had done so, all the heavenly host would have shed tears and Israel would have disappeared. (Alkabetz 1996,1: 310) 60. See Elbaum 2000: 31. Ultimately, it may go back to the statement in y. Meg. 1.1: 'Meg. Est. was given for purposes of midrash [homiletical interpretation]...it is like the true essence of Torah.. .just as one was given for the purposes of midrash, so was the other'. 61. This is a code term for a mystical interpretation. Sadiq is another name for the sefirah yesod. Esther would presumably be represented by the sefirah malkhut, which is the name for the shekhinah. The union between these two sefirot would enhance the harmony in the upper divine realms. 62. The latest stratum of the Zohar. I was unable to locate this source.

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Alkabetz, then, seems to have come full circle. What at first he proclaimed as an embarrassment and something that he almost wished had never been written has ultimately become for him a necessity. The union of Mordecai and Esther is invested with cosmic significance and is necessary for bringing about the salvation of the Jewish people.63 But, aside from the specific kabbalistic references in Menot ha-Levi, I would suggest that Alkabetz's approach is grounded in his fundamental kabbalistic understanding of the words of the Sages. Kabbalists believed that the words of the Sages concealed kernels of mystical truth about the essence of the divine; therefore, their words had to be studied carefully, even if not every rabbinic statement contained these secrets. Still, this basic position implied a different attitude. Along with their generally held opinion that the text never loses its plain meaning , this resulted in a very reverential approach to the words of the 63. It is interesting to note that a contemporary of Alkabetz, Judah Loew ben Bezalel (Maharal) of Prague (c. 1525-1609), the leading Ashkenazic rabbi of his generation, also saw the union of Mordecai and Esther as a prerequisite for effecting the redemption of the people, although, according to Maharal, it is because Esther was not worthy on her own to fulfill this sacred mission. 'And what is mentioned [in the Talmud] do not read TO1? ["for a daughter"] but fTD1? ["for a wife"], it seems that this is to say that Esther was Mordecai's mate.. .and for this reason the redemption came through Mordecai and Esther; otherwise, Esther would not have been worthy of redeeming Israel, since it is not proper for the redemption to be brought about by a woman. Since the essence of her identity is to be subordinate to her husband, a woman is not capable of redeeming another. Therefore the redemption had to come through Mordecai and Esther; since the latter was his wife they were considered like one person and therefore the redemption could be effected through them.' See Judah Loew 1959-60: 21a. He returns to this theme at Est. 2.19 (24b) where he quotes Kabbah bar Lima and opines that Esther secluded herself with Mordecai but did not have sexual relations with him. He adds that Esther was coupled with Ahasuerus and Mordecai in different ways, the principal union being with Mordecai which enabled her to bring about the redemption. Maharal was another exegete, like Alkabetz, who took aggadah very seriously and his commentary too follows the midrash very closely. It would seem that in the case of Maharal as well there is a mystical aspect to his understanding of the aggadah, which deepens his commitment to justifying it. His reference to Esther and Mordecai as redeemers, and the subordinate position of the woman in the scheme of redemption, would seem to have a kabbalistic foundation, although he does not spell it out as explicitly as does Alkabetz. But see Zohar Wa-yishlah 1.169a, which speaks of three redemptions brought about by three righteous men: Moses, Mordecai and the Messiah. On Maharal's attitude to aggadah, see Elbaum 2000: 352-78, especially p. 359 where he alludes to the mystical dimension in Maharal's thought.

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Sages64 and a conviction that all the traditions of the Sages were authentic and reliable interpretations that penetrated to the true essence of the biblical text, and were not merely homiletical embellishments that could be ignored if they seemed illogical, embarrassing or inconvenient. Therefore, every statement uttered by the Sages had to be harmonized with the biblical text and with each other.65 This attitude is reflected very clearly in Alkabetz's Menot ha-Levi. So, whereas Rashi felt free to select those midrashim that helped tell the story he wished to narrate, and most other medieval exegetes considered these midrashic interpretations to be too far removed from thepeshat (contextual) meaning of the text to be even considered, Alkabetz accepted these midrashim as authentic, essential parts of the story and attempted to harmonize, interpret and reconcile them to the best of his ability.66 It is therefore noteworthy, and perhaps gives insight into his character, that, despite his ultimate acceptance of these strange midrashim, he chose to record for posterity his considerable discomfort with them.67 The idea that Mordecai and Esther were a married couple has had a long history in the Jewish tradition, originating in the LXX, flourishing in the Talmud and continuing on into the commentaries of the sixteenth century and beyond.68 The fact that it is elaborated in the Babylonian Talmud will ensure that it will never be forgotten or overlooked. Indeed, the attitude to the midrashic traditions expressed by Alkabetz and his contemporaries marks a new phase in the treatment of this material in exegetical works 64. According to Horowitz (1987: 25), 'the kabbalists dwelled on each and every detail of the aggadah, saw in them deep symbols, and made no attempt to limit the authority of the aggadah'. See also Elbaum 2000: 205-21. 65. As cited above, he criticizes those that would pick and choose among the words of the Sages, saying this tradition is good, this one is not (Alkabetz 1996,1: 310). 66. Even his contemporaries, such as Samuel Uceda and Yom Tov Tzahalon, who deal with these same passages and interpret them as well, do not devote as much energy to apologetics and polemics on behalf of the teachings of the Sages. For them, their treatment of the midrashim was more a matter of course, something to be done in the course of a sermon, and did not seem to be an issue. 67. It should be noted that Alkabetz sets himself apart from earlier exegetes, especially medieval ones, who he feels were not open to receiving the words of the Sages. See, for example, his statement at 2.19 (Alkabetz 1996,1: 299): 'I have already mentioned that the exegetes did not wish to taste the honey and milk of the words of our holy Sages, and they engaged in too much reasoning [Eccl. 7.29]'. 68. Cf., for example, the commentary of Jonathan Eybeschuetz of the seventeentheighteenth centuries.

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and brings it back into the mainstream. From this period on the apologetic attempts to justify, explain away, mitigate or find deeper, esoteric meanings for the more provocative elements of this tradition proliferate. For those who do not feel themselves bound to accept all the words of the Sages as authoritative, this tradition offers a completely different take on the Esther story and raises interesting questions concerning the relationship between the two main protagonists. Even if it is not entirely convincing and does not pass muster as peshat, the Esther-Mordecai marriage connection cannot be dismissed out-of-hand, and pursuing its ramifications offers some room for a bit of playfulness and dramatic invention in keeping with the spirit of Purim.69

69. In a similar vein, the twentieth-century Yiddish poet and dramatist, Itzik Manger, in his Megile lider, embellishes the story with the poignant tale of Fastrigosa, a tailor, who was betrothed to Esther before she was taken to the king, and then had to see his hopes for marital bliss with his true love dashed forever. In general, playfulness and lightheartedness have been characteristic of Purim and the Esther story from the beginning. Transgressing boundaries, flouting Jewish practice, and mocking Jewish law are common practices on Purim. See Greenstein 1987: 231-32.

IMAGES AND THE BOOK OF ESTHER: FROM MANUSCRIPT ILLUMINATION TO MIDRASH Ori Z. Soltes

Background Issues The first questions that that arise regarding the book of Esther concern its historicity and how it managed to find its way into the biblical canon. Its leapfrog over the obvious problems for canonization—the failure to mention the name of God or the land of Israel, thereby ignoring two of the fundamental pillars on which biblical texts are built, to say nothing of rendering the biblically necessary notion of 'divine inspiration' rather suspect—has been the subject of argument on countless occasions. So, too, the actual timing of its events, particularly since, if we find that Ahasuerus corresponds to a particular Persian shah, then our judgment as to whether or not the book at least passes the canonization test of having been written before the time of Ezra would be affected. Some have suggested that the king was one of the Achaemenid Artaxerxes—particularly the first, whose dates of rule (464-425 BCE) just fit the chronological bill and of whose name 'Ahasuerus' seems a reasonable Hebrew form (Lewy 1939). Others have suggested that he was Artaxerxes' father, Xerxes—whose still earlier dates (485-465 BCE) would place him even more comfortably before Ezra's redaction of the Torah (Baumgartner 1972). The renowned Borsippa tablet mentions a royal official named Marduka, who could, perhaps, be Mordecai, as a character alive during the reign of Xerxes I. More important than the specific historicity of the book (for there are problems with each placement which fall beyond this discussion) is the larger historical context of the world of the Judaeans in which the themes of the book's narrative are ultimately set. At the return from Babylonian exile, a substantial body of Judaeans stayed behind; the tension between those struggling to rebuild the land and those, presumably more materially comfortable, in the diaspora—which still exists today between Jewish communities within and outside of Israel—was shifting into place. In the

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literature of that era, such as the book of Daniel and the books of Maccabees, the difficulties of being a religious minority, whether in or away from the land of Israel, are variously engaged. And there are moments when the book of Esther's presence is already a presence within other texts. Thus 2 Mace. 5.36, in referring to 14 Adar as the 'Day of Mordecai', suggests at least that the story contained in the book of Esther was already widely known and celebrated in the second pre-Christian century. Not surprisingly, a range of works within the growing literature of the late Second Temple period, as well as in the aftermath of the temple destruction and the spiritual difficulties that extend from it to beyond the Bar Kochba revolt of the 130s CE, focus on aspects of the Esther story to bring hope to a community overrun with questions and insecurities. Thus, for example, messianic hopefulness attaches itself to the image of Mordecai, messiah-like, on a white horse.1 There is an oblique logic to this besides the imagery of two heroic figures on white donkeys or horses, and that is the relationship between the two spring festivals that follow each other, Purim and Passover. Both share redemption as a fundamental theme. Both also share an emphasis on wine as a symbol of joy. If on Passover one punctuates the Seder with four cups of wine, on Purim one should become sufficiently inebriated not to be able to distinguish 'blessed is Mordecai' from 'cursed is Haman'.2 The death of Haman's ten sons— visually emphasized almost invariably in the Megillah by offering their names in an enlarged font and often by illustrating the scene within the body of text—and the ten plagues of the Exodus share a numerological focus on the suffering of others3 as the price of Israelite-Judean redemption. 1. Or donkey; that is, the idea of the messiah on a white donkey is confuted with the image of Mordecai led by Haman on a horse. 2. The aspect of midrashic mentality that underlies this is gematria: the two phrases ('DIIQ ~P~Q and ]QH ~I"I~IN) add up to precisely the same number (502) in Hebrew numerology, making them simultaneously distinct and identical. 3. More precisely: Haman's sons, and not just Haman, suffer; the Pharaoh's people, and ultimately the firstborn of his sons, and not just the Pharaoh, suffer. Such obliquely balanced thinking habitually reaches far afield for analogues. So even the narrative backdrop to the Passover story—the arrival of the Israelites in Egypt—offers parallels to the Purim narrative. Joseph is noted for his beautiful raiment, as Esther will be. Joseph's jailing due to Potiphar's wife leads to his redemption (and the salvation of his family when famine strikes the entire region) by way of the Pharaoh's cupbearer/ wine steward, as Esther's rise is a consequence of a wine feast and the salvation she can affect for her people is also made possible in the context of such a feast. Indeed,

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Moreover, Passover culminates with Shavuot, when Moses issues the ultimate 'letter of salvation' (the Torah), as the Megillah and Purim culminate with the letters of redemption sent out by Esther and Mordecai to the Jews throughout Ahasuerus's 127 provinces. That such connections should be made, connecting Purim and Passover but also Purim and Shavuot, is validated by the calendar of events that are specified in the Megillah. Only three months are named, Nisan, Adar and Shivan, which are highlighted, respectively, by Passover, Purim and Shavuot. All three months and their festivals partake of a salvational message within a biblical context,4 on both physical and spiritual grounds. Aggadic literature also wonders and worries whether Vashti was actually put to death (Meg. 13a), while emphasizing how Esther was more beautiful than any Median or Persian women (Est. R. 6.9); like 'the myrtle' (the meaning of her Hebrew name, HDin, in 2.17) she was of ideal height, neither too short nor too tall (Meg. 13a). Indeed, Abba Goryon 2 notes that, whereas before Esther's queenship, Ahasuerus compared all women with a statue of Vashti that he kept by his bed, he replaced it with an image of Esther after she became queen. The aggadic literature also finds her criticizing Ahasuerus for killing Vashti and telling him how she (Esther) is descended from the royal house of Saul (Meg. 13a). The influences exerted generally on Second Temple period texts and commentary from the growing diaspora experiences of the Judaeans emphatically include those of Greek literature. The very idea of seeing Esther, Ahasuerus and Haman as a kind of triangle reflects a continuum of the Greek literary tradition that repeatedly occupies itself with that motif. So, too, the basis for the tragic literature at the core of that tradition, a dramatic reversal of fortune (Aristotle, Poetics 1451), underlies the story

she and Haman and Ahasuerus are a sort of triangle in that last evening's feast—the villain's definitive end comes when, imploring Esther on his knees with his head practically in her lap, he is seen by the king in what is mistaken for a compromising position vis-a-vis the queen. So Joseph, Potiphar and Zulaika (Potiphar's wife, named only by post-biblical traditions) are a triangle; Joseph is mistakenly thought to have compromised Potiphar's trust with respect to Zulaika. Joseph's story yields a happy ending for him, and subsequent servitude followed by redemption for his descendants. Esther's story leads to a happy ending for her, near-destruction and subsequent redemption for her people. 4. The texts underlying the celebration of Hanukkah, primarily 1 and 2 Maccabees, are extra-biblical precisely because there can be no doubt of their post-Ezra date of composition.

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of Raman's fall. Greek comedy reverses the norms of Greek tragedy; heroes are replaced by antiheroes and 'unhappy' endings are rendered worthy of laughter. One can thus perceive an oblique relationship between that tradition and the book of Esther: the reversal of fortune is a happy, not unhappy, turn of events for the hero and heroine; the demise of Haman and his sons, is, for the audience, laughable; and everyone celebrates by allowing the fun of the story's finale to spill off the stage (and off the narrative page) into a raucous festival.5 After the destruction of 70 CE, and with the bifurcated development of the Judaean tradition into Judaism and Christianity by the end of the century, there is a converse development, the appropriation of key elements of the text from Judaism into the Christian tradition. There Esther is seen as a redemptive figure prefiguring the Virgin Mary: as Mary intercedes on behalf of Christians with God, Esther intercedes on behalf of the Jews with Ahasuerus. This is how we frequently find her in medieval Christian iconography.6 Such transformations also continue through significant passages of diaspora Jewish history. Not surprisingly, for instance, in the world of the Marranos, Esther is the ultimate Marrana, who hides her faith but reveals it when the time is right. Of necessity her world is defined by Mordecai on the one hand and Ahasuerus on the other as the Marrano world is defined by Judaism and the God of Israel on the one hand and Christianity and Jesus on the other. The entire emphasis, in celebrating the holiday, on the play between revelation and hiddenness—accentuated by the use of costumes and masks, and no doubt influenced by the Christian carnival celebrations (which more or less coincide on the calendar with Purim)— would have had a particularly strong appeal, as a symbol of their own condition, for generations of crypto-Jews. Illuminated and Illustrated Traditions The text and the various interpretive literatures that it yields reflect an evolving reality in the Second Temple period, the existence of minority 5. This metaphor becomes literalized with the development ofthepurimspiel. 6. This is not a unique instance of such a transformative appropriation. The most obvious other instance is with regard to Gen. 22, wherein Isaac is viewed as a prefigurative salvational/sacrificial figure in Christian ideology. He is the son offered by his father and saved at the last moment, who anticipates the offering of the Son (Christ) by the Father to save humankind.

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diaspora Judaean communities, often insecure and even at risk, which became yet more widespread and insecure in the centuries following the destruction of the temple and the Bar Kokhba disaster. If the conditions of diaspora and, for that matter, Palestinian Jewish life were relatively calm and secure from the 140s through the first part of the fourth century, by the 380s the pattern was shifting into place that would place Jewish communities continuously at the rarely benign and often hostile mercy of their nonJewish neighbors. And the book of Esther offered a paradigm of hope through continuous faith for eventual redemption from such a pattern. Moreover, the very non-canonical feel of the book of Esther together with its being embedded in this reality lent to it particular directional possibilities for interpretational license, just as it yields a sui generis raucousness of celebrational customs even in the synagogue, where noise of all sorts drowns out Haman's name every time it appears in the reading of the Megillah. Further, that the book sustains extended focus from Christians as well, for whom its heroine offers an important archetype, further underscores its accessibility to midrashic/aggadic sensibilities. And finally, what was possible verbally was also possible visually. Indeed Esther stands out among biblical books as inviting visual interpretation among Jews, even as its interpretive significance for Christians invited visual expression in Christian art as well. Perhaps Esther's first appearance in a Jewish context shows her in the wall-painting cycle at Dura Europas (c. 250 CE) in modern-day Syria, where she takes her place with Moses, David, Ezekiel 37 (the resurrection and refleshing of the righteous dead) and other figures and scenes associated with biblical moments of salvation and/or messianic moments of future redemption (Fig. la, below). Indeed at Dura we see Esther and Ahasuerus enthroned. We also see Mordecai on a regal white horse, reinforcing his position of connectedness to messianic themes (Fig. Ib). Thereafter one finds Esther's image in repeated Christian art and architectural contexts that may be said to emulate the Jewish imagery at Dura. Esther appears in the ninth-century wall paintings of St Clemente in Rome. Again we find her carved in relief over the north portal of Chartres Cathedral (c. 1220) and over the western portal of the great pilgrimage church of Santiago de Compostela in northwest Spain, among the Hebrew biblical 'ancestors' of Christ. We also find her in tapestries, such as a seventeenth-century Belgian tapestry in the cathedral of Saragossa and eighteenth-century Gobelin tapestries in a number of places as diverse as the Elysee Palace in Paris and the National Cathedral in Washington, DC.

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Various subjects based on the book of Esther were taken up by a number of important fifteenth- and sixteenth-century Italian Renaissance artists, such as Botticelli, Filippino Lippi and Andrea Mantegna; their Baroque counterparts, Tintoretto and Veronese, were drawn to the potential for pomp in the feasting scenes they painted. So, too, northern seventeenthcentury masters, from Jan Steen and Peter Paul Rubens to Rembrandt, treated the subject variously. By this time we can relocate the Esther story in the Jewish visual tradition beyond the synagogue walls of late antiquity and within megillot themselves. However reticent that tradition is with regard to embellishing the text of the Torah and the Bible at large, where the Scroll of Esther is concerned the situation has been completely different. If for the text read out in the synagogue there remained a degree of visual reticence, for those commissioned for private use brilliant illuminations and illustrations were quite customary. The issues that make it suspect as canon, most particularly the fact that the name of God is never mentioned in the text, make its extensive visual decoration feasible. Moreover, even as it finally was introduced into the Bible, it was only halfheartedly accepted as part of the canon. As the phrase Megillat Esther reminds us, it has continued to this day to be read as a separate scroll, as if it were not part of the Bible. The positive consequence of this is to reinforce the possibility of a broad and varied range of illustrative efforts. In fact, here too Passover and Purim offer general parallels, since the Haggadah challenges the Megillah for supremacy in the realm of colorful and imaginative illustration.7 Illuminated Hebrew manuscripts have a history that may be traced back nearly a thousand years, emerging first (as far as what has survived) in the Islamic world, although it is likely, as Cecil Roth has suggested, that the tradition extends back perhaps as far as late antiquity (Roth 1983). Moreover, the earliest Christian manuscript illuminations focus on Hebrew biblical stories rather than those of the New Testament, suggesting Jewish prototypes. It would be strange if the free-ranging illustrative urge expressed in ancient synagogue wall paintings and mosaic floors were not

7. Where the Haggadah is concerned, the explanation of visual lushness is different but related: it is a text read at home around an unusually festive dinner table. And it is a text for a dinner that can take hours to complete, but at which even the youngest of children play key participatory roles. Thus, providing a visually exciting work would have been both a practical desideratum and a goal not blocked by formal synagoguecontext concerns.

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echoed in manuscripts, especially those, like the Megillah, whose use spilled outside formal centers of divine-human interface. But it is impossible to know when the first illuminated or illustrated megillot Esther were made. Images adorning handwritten documents are generally intended to enlighten by means of the interpretation they offer; to reflect light, both literally, by means of the use, where possible, of gold leaf and brilliant colors, and metaphorically, by the brilliance of their insights and their design and execution. 'Illumination' usually refers to highlighting initial letters in a manuscript and to miniature images accompanying the text. Larger scale drawings and the highlighting of an entire text are referred to as 'illustration'. Both are part of the visual history of the Esther scroll. And there is appropriate and intrinsic irony in this. Key elements of the narrative revolve around hiddenness, not only of Esther's identity but of her redemptive plan and even Haman's motives (he actually hates Mordecai rather than the Jews per se). Yet the role of such visual adornment is revelation of that which is hidden (as it is for verbal midrash). Thus, when we enter the realm of illuminated and illustrated Esther scrolls we enter the realm of visual midrash. As noted, the possibilities for limitless expression of the Megillah were enhanced by the fact that it was treated ambiguously with respect to its place in the Bible. Moreover, the fun-making celebratory context furthered the emphasis on a folkloric rather than a scholarly approach to the text. Thus, emphasis on 'good guys' and 'bad guys', rather than the subtler issues which rabbinic literature might raise regarding the relationship between Esther and Mordecai, or the nature and fate of Vashti, predominate in the visual tradition (see Walfish in this volume). That is, the visual tradition of interpretation and revelation offers a counterpoint to the verbal tradition. Like other illuminated and illustrated Hebrew manuscripts, Esther scrolls also occupy a corner of the larger question of defining 'Jewish' art. By this I mean that, if one assumes that the scribe was Jewish, that by no means assures us that the illuminator or illustrator was a Jew. Sometimes a colophon will indicate the name(s) of the scribe and/or the artist, but where the information is not present we can only hypothesize, based on issues ranging from particulars of subject to styles recognized from other illuminations. Thus a Hebrew illuminated manuscript is not necessarily (with regard to the artist's identity) a Jewish illuminated manuscript. The artist could well be a Christian, commissioned by a Jewish family or community to embellish its Megillah; such an artist might come to do this habitually,

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thus developing his own distinctive visual vocabulary, as was so often the case in other 'Judaica' contexts.8 Some megillot have no illustrations or illuminations at all, perhaps due to the surfacing of Second Commandment concerns regarding images, but often simply because of the more visually confining synagogue context. But many of these are encased, as their illuminated and illustrated cousins are, in magnificently worked covers. Like Torah crowns, finials, shields and pointers, as well as hanukkiyyot, kiddush goblets, besamim boxes, Sabbath candlesticks and other 'Judaica', it is more than likely that most such repousse and filigree work was not done by Jewish craftspeople until the nineteenth century, due both to guild restrictions and inhibitions.9 Thus, significant aspects of the visual patterns relating to Esther scrolls raise interesting larger questions regarding how 'Jewish' they are. While such questions apply to other contexts of visual self-expression, they are particularly appropriate to a text for which the beginning point of questioning pertains to how appropriately 'biblical' it is. Illuminated and Illustrated Megillot: A Brief and Partial History One is struck by the range and variety of approaches to both the text and its accompanying visuals as one peruses the Jewish world. One of the earliest illuminated megillot that has survived is from Germany, dated to approximately 1300 (Fig. 2). Each of the colorful separators (offering baskets of fruits or flowers and sometimes the rudiments of faux-marble columns) between columns of text is marked by an oval-shaped lozenge with either a scene—a very German-looking Shushan, for instance—or a character from the story. By contrast, a sepia-illuminated work from southern France from the Cecil Roth collection at Oxford and dated to the early sixteenth century offers a more finished style, but without any color (Fig. 3). Some scenes, such as the hanging of Haman's sons, are placed within the narrative, while large armed figures separate the columns of the text. Along the registers above and below the text, small visual passages from the story or figures within it are set off in cartouches and labeled, the 8. Most of the ritual objects made throughout Christendom until the late nineteenth century were made by Christians, since the context of their fabrication was usually in guilds, which did not include Jewish members. For a fuller discussion, see Narkiss 1983 as well as segments la, 3a and 3b of Soltes 1984-90. 9. How will a Jew, as a purely practical matter, enter a guild by swearing loyalty in the name of 'the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost'?

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whole overrun with intricate floral and vegetal (possibly vine, appropriate to the wine-related beginning of the story and to that aspect of the festival's celebration) motifs, together with rampant birds with outstretched wings above and lions below. This pattern of decoration is repeated almost identically in a 1748 Esther scroll from Venice (Fig. 4), among others; a popular pattern might persist for several generations. Moreover, this work raises the matter of the order of composition; if in some cases the text was placed first, leaving space around it for illuminated letters or illustrations, in this case obviously the illustrational pattern, already devised, was put in place first, and the text was written in afterwards. This Megillah we know to have been done by Arye Loeb ben Daniel, a traveling copyist originally from Poland. But obviously his work was mainly the text; he essentially copied the decoration from the earlier prototype. A similar issue attends a third black and white, engraving-decorated Megillah from Italy, but apparently brought to Amsterdam after 1641 and perhaps done before that year. Most of its details are identical to those of a Megillah engraved and signed by Salom Italia (probably born in Mantua c. 1619, and settled in Amsterdam around 1641), but dated to several decades later. Indeed the manuscript text was apparently not finished until c. 1673, nearly two decades after Salom Italia's death. As Salom did several megillot characterized by substantive rusticated arcades surmounted by curved broken frontons embedded with small landscape scenes and crowned by floral arrangements and rampant lions or cherubs, we can suppose that the earlier one from Italy (Fig. 5) without a signature is as much his work as a later one (not pictured) that, signed and virtually identical to the first, is deemed to have been finished after his death. These works are of particular importance because Salom Italia is one of the first Jewish artists of note outside the context of manuscript illumination and illustration. Possibly the earliest extant portrait of a Jew by a Jewish artist is his rather pedestrian 1642 engraved portrait of the Sephardic Amsterdam Rabbi Manasseh Ben Israel (of whom Rembrandt did a much more compelling series of engravings), the one-time teacher and subsequent excommunicator of Spinoza. There are also distinctive Italian megillot, presumably from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, which are in effect papercuts. The scenes and decorative elements are cut out of the parchment all around the large spaces left for the text, and the whole placed against a silk lining, which therefore shows through the papercut decoration and offers coloristic

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contrast to the parchment. It may be from such Italian megilht, the style and popularity of which carried to the Netherlands during the seventeenth century, that detailed elements for papercut mizrahs found their way into eastern Europe and Alsace, while also being carried south into North Africa.10 Italy is, in any case, an important source for Hebrew manuscript illumination and illustration in the sixteenth through eighteenth centuries. One of the most stunning is the so-called (on account of its current location) 'Washington Megillah' (Figs. 6a and b). Richly colored in reds and greens it offers, as some megillot do, the blessings said before and after the reading of the book of Esther in the synagogue, in this case on a separate broadside accompanying the scroll. The broadside sheet is unusual in including an appended list by the scribe of those who should be cursed and blessed, (ending 'blessed, blessed, blessed be Mordecai; blessed, blessed, blessed be Esther; blessed, blessed, blessed be all of Israel; cursed, cursed, cursed be Haman; cursed, cursed, cursed be [his wife] Zeresh'), together with the author's plea in tiny, Rashi script letters, 'as thou hast taken retribution against our enemies (of old), do so against evil doers now and in the future, Amen!' More interesting still is the inclusion of an acrostic poem (included in some Sephardic liturgies as part of the pre-reading recitation) by Abraham Ibn Ezra, the fourteenth-century Spanish Jewish poet who was also a biblical scholar, whose commentary on the five scrolls was renowned. Its refrain reads: 'Those who read the Megillah, sing joyous songs to God, for it was a time of exultation for Israel'. Moreover, the broadside's rich illustrations (more often such a prelude sheet with blessings is itself not illuminated or illustrated) are hardly inferior to those which adorn the accompanying Megillah itself. The first upper scene, copied from repeated versions of the Venice Haggadah

10. Just as in the synagogue the wall facing Jerusalem was marked by the presence of the Torah Niche and later the Holy Ark at its center, traditional Jewish homes all over the world, but particularly in parts of Europe and North Africa, denoted the wall facing Jerusalem by a decoration with appropriate inscriptions. Since for most of the Euro-Mediterranean Diaspora that initially meant marking the wall facing east, the decoration came to be called 'mizrah'. This word not only means 'east(ward)', but as an acronym means 'from this side (comes) the breath of life'. The concept of 'east' became so important that in Poland or Tsarist Russia, for instance, from where Jerusalem would be south, the eastern wall remained (and remains) the preferred one in synagogue and home. The latter is marked by a mizrah tablet and the medium of the mizrah is frequently the papercut.

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(another interesting instance of a deliberate visual connection between the two festivals) from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, suggests a Passover seder, although since food has been replaced by open books, it is actually a study session or a reading of the Megillah (but not in scroll form!). This scene offers a compositional counterpoint, one might say, to the image of the lower left scene, which falls directly below the last line of Ibn Ezra's poem and its final words 'May the Redeemer arrive!': the Messiah, on the back of a donkey, preceded by a herald, is about to enter the city of Jerusalem. Both words and image are also drawn from the 1609, 1629, 1695 and 1740 editions of the Venice Haggadah. Similarly, the spirited dance scene in a garden shown on the upper left is a counterpoint to the boy and girl being read to on the lower right. A king and queen—Ahasuerus and Esther?—occupy the lower center of the composition. These present and future scenes are echoed in style and coloristic sensibility by the scenes of the past on the Megillah itself, illustrations of the biblical Purim narrative. The whole, however, is placed within a lively contemporary northern Italian landscape, just as the garments, furnishings, architecture and musical instruments are all recognizably derived from that milieu. The anonymous work (both text and illustrations) appears to be the accomplishment of one hand, although one whose name may never be known. Exquisite Italian megillot, festooned in baroque pomp, continue into the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, often as copies of earlier works. Thus, such a late work in the Smithsonian collection copies (with respect to its decoration) with paint a Megillah with engraved decoration of 1743 by Francesco Griselini, a non-Jewish artist (Fig. 7). The lower illustrations of the decorative border present both contemporary vignettes that pertain to celebrating Purim and scenes from the Purim story, and above, the baroque arcade surmounted by balustrades is in turn capped by decorative abstract and floral elements that are flanked not by lions or cherubs but by rampant roosters, as if to underscore the principle of vigilance. This is both the most obvious characteristic of the hero, Mordecai, but also, given the diaspora setting of the story, a warning to the Jewish people to remain always vigilant with respect to both fastness of faith and awareness of the shiftable winds of their neighbors' moods. The text itself has also been presented in an interesting manner: it has been composed so that every column begins with the word "pftn ('the king'). The entirety is preceded by a typically grandiose opening illumination—an elaborate floral arrange-

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ment that looks almost like an escutcheon, where the coat-of-arms of the family that commissioned the Megillah and/or symbols representing the family name11 might be added. Indeed, there is space for a dedicatory inscription or one identifying the owner, but it has been left empty. More interesting still, the garland is interwoven with four animals that allude to a passage from Pirke Abot. The passage, 5.3, reads (in part): 'be bold as a leopard and light as an eagle and swift as a gazelle and strong as a lion to do the will of your father in heaven'. This too, then, obliquely accords with the symbolism of the rooster motif along the decorative border of the text: of clinging carefully to one's faith no matter how difficult—or inviting—the conditions of diaspora life. Nowhere has the history of diaspora Jewish life been more instructive of positive and negative possibilities and actualities than in Germany. And from Germany derive some particularly fascinating Esther megillot from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. One from 1680 is primarily decorated, albeit lavishly, every inch of surface covered, in black and white (Fig. 8). It includes rampant unicorns and birds flanking fountains. The water as source and symbol of life, corresponding in the Jewish context to the Torah ('A Tree of Life to them that hold fast to it', as is repeated thrice weekly in prayerbook Torah service)12 is an oft-seen symbol in both Jewish and Christian art. Moreover the unicorn has a specifically redemptive connotation in the aggadic literature: as darkness fell on the night of Adam's first day of existence, he was terrified that, if and as he went to sleep, he would never wake up, that the night would last forever. So relieved and thankful was he when the sun arose and day had returned that he built an altar and made an offering to God of a one-horned animal. The site of that altar and its offering, countless generations later, was where Abraham offered Isaac, and a thousand years later still where Solomon built the Temple (see Ned. 8b, Yom. 20b; y. Ta 'an. 4, 68b; Sop. 7.5). Thus

11. A pair of hands extended upwards in the position of the Priestly Benediction to symbolize 'Cohen' or some related name; or a laver and bowl to stand for some form of'Levi'; or say, a Castle to suggest 'Castelo', etc. These symbolic images are similar to what one finds on Jewish gravestones in communities as diverse as Venice and Prague. 12. The placement of the fountain between two figures corresponds to a long Near Eastern, Mediterranean and Western visual tradition which places a tree, a fountain, a column or a hero (symbolic variations of each other), between paired lions, peacocks, deer or cherubic border creatures. These convey the notion of maintaining ordered mastery over the forces of chaos and/or of expressing a connection to divinity.

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the unicorn offers a chain of associations appropriate to the redemptive, messianic mood of the Megillah. But perhaps the most fascinating visual aspect of this scroll is the roundel that follows the conclusion of the text (which is itself presented in a series of roundels), the image of a joyous and almost riotous celebration of the holiday. A table filled with goodies occupies the center, surrounded by characters in costume, several attired as jesters, including a pair (at the bottom of the composition) who sit, back-to-back, on a donkey, as if in comedic distortion of the Mordecai-led-by-Haman and messianic ideas. The figure facing to the rear holds up a carafe of wine as everyone seems to be well into his/her cups. A second German Megillah, dated to 1760 (Figs. 9a and b), offers an arcade to frame the columns of text, with floral motifs decorating the arcade columns. In the springing of the arches is a colorful sequence of scenes illustrating the story, with clothing and setting that is visually part of the contemporary German world. One of the more interesting sections presents the hanging of Haman's sons followed by a spirited rendition of the Jews defending themselves against their enemies. Between these two the column of text lists Haman's ten sons by name, and as is so often the case, the font is enlarged to three or four times the size of that in the rest of the work. The list is interwoven with illustrations (where the body of the rest of the text is not); a series of five trees is being chopped down, each by two woodcutters. While this is intended, no doubt, to suggest the preparations for the multiple hangings, it also conveys emphatically the notion of the extirpation of Haman's male line: the tree of his family line is being destroyed tenfold, his name therefore being blotted out (in symbolic terms, to the tenth generation). Thus it offers a conceptual counterpoint to the theme of Jewish continuity that underlies the narrative at large. And if at this point in the story, the king, God-like, steps back and gives the Jews the right to defend themselves and the instruments with which to do so, then Jewish continuity as a proactive, not a passive, matter is underscored. To the west, in the area where Germany borders France, is the distinctive Jewish community of Alsace, with its combined aspects of German and French identity. Perhaps it is not surprising that in a late eighteenthcentury Alsatian Megillah (Fig. 10), the roundels of text, ensconced in colorful garlands, flowers and figures, should include a celebration accompanied by musicians from the court, the central figure of which is a folkloristic Vashti looking very much like Marie Antoinette. The fall of the one queen is seen as an echo of the fall of the other, albeit under very

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different circumstances and with very different overall consequences. Not entirely different, where French and Alsatian Jewry was concerned; the aftermath of the French Revolution, which brought about the death of Marie Antoinette, led to the Emancipation decree which accorded Jews full 'Frenchness' and the attendant citizenship rights; an echo, obliquely, of the long-term consequences of the fall of Vashti for the Jews of Shushan. A somewhat earlier Megillah from Alsace, dated to 1730 (Fig. 11), is marked by a carefully wrought zodiac surrounding the particular roundel of text in which Haman plots the destruction of Mordecai and the Jews by the assertions about them that he makes to the king. A well-attired figure who occupies one of the four corners around the zodiac circle reaches into it with his walking stick, to touch the two fish of Pisces (the zodiac sign which corresponds to the month of Adar in which Purim is celebrated). Pisces corresponds to the time when the destruction was to have taken place, and plays on the tradition that Haman sneeringly interpreted that zodiac sign to mean the Jews would be swallowed like fish (Ginzberg 1913:401-402). The scene of a zodiac also falls well within the Jewish visual tradition, of course—from the sixth-century CE mosaic synagogue floor at Bet Alpha in the Galilee to the seventeenth- and eighteenth-century cupolas of timber synagogues in Chodorow and Targowica, Poland. In the context of the Purim story, it is particularly appropriate because of the calendrical emphasis within it: the lots (D'HIS) were cast in the first month, Nisan, (that is, the month of spring and rebirth and the month of Passover and its liberation). The decree was emitted in the twelfth month, Adar, and the destruction was to take place in the middle of that month (corresponding to the full moon). In the third month, Shi van (marked on the Jewish calendar by the Israelite presence at Sinai and the receiving of the Ten Commandments), on the third and twentieth days, Ahasuerus's counter-decree was announced. Subsequently, the tradition of giving gifts to the poor on the declared holiday of 14/15 Adar was expressly evolved 'so that these days may be remembered and kept throughout every generation'. And it is this act that we perhaps see in the lower corner of this same register. Megillot of exquisite visual interest are as far-flung as the Jewish diaspora has become throughout the centuries. From Morocco, an early nineteenth-century scroll (Fig. 12), with alternating curvilinear and rectilinear rosettes around its opening border and along the verticals separating the columns of text, opens with the blood-red words announcing that this is

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'the scroll of Esther the Queen and Mordecai the Jew' in large squared letters. This handsome decorative calligraphy continues into the second opening register and along the upper and lower horizontal borders of the text with the comparative genealogies of Mordecai and Haman. That of Mordecai is carried back through Jacob to Isaac and Abraham; that of Haman is traced back to Jacob's brother, Esau, offering an interesting twist to the pattern found in any number of mythological traditions from around the world wherein half-brothers, one good and the other evil, battle for supremacy at the beginning of time as we know it.13 From early nineteenth-century Kai Fung Fu, China, comes another interesting scroll (Figs. 13a and b). The Jewish community of Kai Fung Fu had been established by at least the eleventh century, when the emperor of the Northern Sung imperium officially extended an invitation to the Jews to remain there. The stele which records that decree of invitation includes the names of the seven most prominent families in the Jewish community at that time. But the community had shrunk (by attrition, assimilation and the shrinkage of the city itself, subject to frequent flooding from the Yellow River) to almost nothing by the time this scroll was executed, presumably for its last survivors. Along with floral and semi-abstract vegetal motifs, as well as unusual animal forms that decorate the spaces between, above and below the columns of text, are delightful figures—Chinese figures—dancing in joy at the happy outcome of the story, together with a gigantic figure with bow and arrow who falls within the text itself where that outcome in its most extreme aspect has been spelled out in large letters: the listing of Haman's ten sons who were hanged with their father in lieu of Mordecai. Toward the Modern Era From eighteenth-century Galicia (Poland) an unadorned manuscript— which reminds us that not every Megillah is illuminated or illustrated—is housed in an exquisite silver case (Fig. 14), calling to mind two issues. First, the decorative urge that expresses itself on the scroll itself might as well or instead be directed toward its casing. In the present instance, the

13. Thus, for example, the stories of Osiris and Seth, Thor and Loki, Ahura Mazda and Ahriman, from three rather disparate cultural traditions, are part of that pattern. The genealogies given by this Megillah of Haman and Mordecai make them distant cousins, descended ultimately from two brothers of the same parentage.

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case is adorned with key narrative scenes, significant among them the image of Mordecai on the horse being drawn through Shushan by the infuriated Haman. Above them a figure of Esther enlarged by significance perspective is seated on a sumptuous throne. The whole is crowned by a fearsome bird of prey cum dragon—a kind of border creature to protect the entryway from our profane reality into the sacred realm of God's word, hardly the sort of creature that one finds with any frequency in Jewish visual contexts. And thus the second matter that this silver case calls to mind: the analogue of the question of Jewish authorship of the illustrative decorations within which so many Megillah texts are placed, is the broader matter of which that question is part, the Jewish creation of Judaica per se, and thus of such Megillah cases. Most often works in precious metals which served the Jewish communities of Christendom were made by Christian, not Jewish, artists, due to guild restrictions and inhibitions (as I have noted above). So, whereas the manuscript tradition offers ample opportunities to assume Jewish artistry, the often stunning cases are more problematic. That would apply, as well, to a lush gold filigree Megillah case from Venice, dated to the late seventeenth or early eighteenth century (Fig. 15). But that situation begins to change gradually in the course of the nineteenth century. By the time we arrive at a tiny 1927 silver case, filigreed and embossed, we have arrived at emphatically Jewish craftsmanship (Fig. 16). The work was done in the antepenultimate year of existence of the Bezalel Arts School in Jerusalem, which had been founded by Boris Schatz in 1906 to foster visual culture as an aspect of Zionism, to generate 'Jewish art' and thus to complete the change from centuries of forced estrangement for European Jewry from many forms of visual self-expression. The emphasis in the school was as much on the range of craft arts as on sculpture and painting. Intense decorative interest extended from ashtrays and desk blotters to hanukiyyot and megillot, of which this was an example produced for mass consumption (designed by a master silversmith and mass-produced by his students). Intended as gifts for patrons of the school, the cases were decorated with the words 'Bezalel, Jerusalem' in both Hebrew and English. The art of filigree which was developed at Bezalel built particularly on the skills of Yemenite Jewish craftsmen imported to the school for that purpose, for in the Islamic world it was almost uniquely Jews who produced the varied work in precious metals which was rarely open to them in Christendom. This we see well exemplified in such a Megillah case.

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The scenes are characteristic moments in the Esther narrative, such as her dangerous audience before the king. Typical of Bezalel style, the figures are attired in the Near Eastern fashion consistent not only with sartorial assumptions regarding the time of Esther and Mordecai, but with the Bezalel interest in such fashion as symptomatic of the visual ambience indigenous to the land to which the Zionist dream pushed. The text of the scroll itself emulates the feature I earlier noted of a late nineteenth-early twentieth-century Italian Megillah, wherein every column begins with the word "pQn ('the king'). After every seven columns a scene from the story appears, with Hebrew words describing it, painted with little background, as if within rudimentary stage settings, by Ze'ev Raban, one of the masters at Bezalel. Raban was renowned as a miniaturist. Another of the megillot that he designed at Bezalel (Figs. 17a, b and c) is far more complex in its visual elements. Lush scenes—such as that of Ahasuerus and his noblemen deeply ensconced in drinking and feasting, of the king lasciviously stroking his beard as he examines the modest and beautiful Esther, of Ahasuerus reclining uncomfortably, unable to sleep, as his court historian reads to him from a scroll of the exploit of Mordecai at saving the king's life— occupy the bottom register, each below two columns of text. As a unit, each of these groupings (double text column and accompanying illustration) is framed above and on two sides by appropriate infinitizing patterns of symbolic motifs. The infinitizing patterns are drawn from the visual vocabulary of the Arabo-Islamic world, emulated by Bezalel as another indigenous element of the Near East and thus as a potentially integral part of engendering a national (as opposed to diaspora) Jewish art. Grapes and vines surround the first such scene, hunters and winsome deer in a thicket of red heart-shaped foliage surround the second, and guardians with large drawn swords and a series of well-lit oil lamps in niches surround the third. The nineteenth and twentieth centuries carry us in a range of new directions. On the one hand, a well-crafted work from the early twentieth century of anonymous provenance (Fig. 18), with the blessings for reading the Megillah placed at the beginning of the scroll itself, is of interest in this discussion for a particular reason. Unlike the circular cartouches above the columns of text, which are occupied by the busts of individuals from the story, the curvilinear diamond-shaped cartouche above the blessings is occupied by a six-pointed star. That geometric motif has a long history of use in pagan, Jewish, Christian and Muslim art. Only gradually, beginning in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries in central Europe,

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does it assume its position as a Jewish symbol per se, the Star (or Shield) of David. That process is completed in the context of the same renascent Zionist movement that would yield the Bezalel School and its ambitions. Specifically, Theodor Herzl used it in 1895 as the cover image for his new Zionist periodical Die Welt, whereafter its rise as the most abundantly used symbol in Jewish art was precipitous. Thus this Megillah begins with an image, the ultimate symbolic significance of which is the oblique echo of the messianic imagery I have earlier noted; and in a particular sense, at least for part of the dispersed Jewish world, a symptom of the fulfilment of the hope associated with that earlier image. By that time, other forms of visual expression were also being explored by Jewish artists and artisans. Where Purim is concerned, this includes supplementing the decoration of the scroll of Esther and its case with some of these other forms. Thus a late nineteenth-century work signed by Sara Eydel Weissberg, made of perforated paper embroidered with wool and silk and created in Jerusalem, is intended to be hung on the wall (Fig. 19). On it are scenes: Esther before Ahasuerus, who acknowledges her presence with his scepter; Mordecai on the horse with Haman trumpeting his honors (and a Torah scroll, emblazoned with the Star of David, in Mordecai's hand!); heralds galloping up to the walled capital city of Shushan; and Haman being hanged as his ten sons await the same fate. One of the charming aspects of the images is how Haman and his sons (except when Haman is being hanged, of course) are shown wearing crown-like versions of the three-cornered hat with which the Jewish folk-tradition had come to imbue the story's villain. The figures are labeled and narrative passages are added for further clarification, in Hebrew, while the middle text passage is in Yiddish, identifying the artist. Such work anticipates the art of painters like Shalom of Safed (1880-1960) who combine Hebrew and Yiddish in presenting biblical scenes and contemporary celebrations that correspond to them. Apposite in conception—and reflecting the revival of a centuries' long Jewish visual tradition that fashions text as image—is the micrograph dated to 1870 and signed by Hirsch Ilya Schlimowitz from Russia (Fig. 20). The entire text of the book of Esther is formed into the figure of a bear (the artist has signed the work in the space below the bear's belly, between his front and rear paws). Only 7.5 inches long and 5.25 inches high, it is a typical instance of micrographic virtuosity. Whether the bear form is intended to be significant—surely in 1870 it would have been reasonable for a Jew to see the Tsarist regime as Haman-like—is open to conjecture.

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Twentieth-Century Twists The imagery of Purim extends yet further as we follow the course laid out by Jewish artists, particularly American Jewish artists, into the last quarter of the twentieth century. Leonard Baskin (1922-2000), for example, renowned as a graphic artist and maker of fine books, including a distinctive Passover Haggadah, created various large-scale portraits of heroic figures, male and female, from the Jewish and other traditions, over the course of the decades. One of these is 'Esther', whom we see identified in large Hebrew letters, in a pose, with hand on heart, that suggests a protestation or plea (Fig. 21). What makes the image (dated to c. 1975) particularly intriguing is that it is placed in a kind of spaceless space, therefore offering no specific setting in which to contextualize her, and that her garment is quite plain, as indeed she herself is. If I have understood her gesture correctly, she is either in the act of appealing to Ahasuerus (to come to the feast at which he and Haman are the only invitees) or petitioning him to save her people, explaining that she, as a Jew, is at risk by the decree that has placed the power of destroying them in Raman's hands (which is the denouement of the last in the series of such feasts). Baskin has thus accomplished two things by his (re)vision of Esther. First, he has deliberately ignored the assumption that her beauty is merely physical, and implied that it was irresistible charm and intellect that captured the king's attention beyond other women in the first place, and, when she approached him in his throne room or in her dining room, that achieved her redemptive ends.14 Second, since there is no surrounding visual context, and her garment is not only plain but is neither culturally nor time-specific, and, since she wears no adornment that could otherwise identify her as 'Persian' or anything else, the artist has universalized her. Esther as a paragon of female heroism is neither merely Jewish (although she is, given the Hebrew rendering of her name writ large) nor from some far-away exotic time and land; she can represent any cultural or ethnic or religious background, and her story can represent the moral victory of the oppressed of any cultural or ethnic or religious background—and she can be viewed as a contemporary.

14. Thus, as it were, emulating the reality of Cleopatra, renowned by tradition as a beauty, who appears not to have been one (physically), but rather to have conquered the likes of Julius Caesar and Marc Antony by her charismatic character.

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Contemporary re-examinations of the Megillat Esther, both verbal and visual, in some respects bring us full circle back to the early rabbinic concerns manifest in the aggadic and midrashic literature. What did happen to the woman whose demise made possible Esther's rise? Why should Vashti be regarded as less heroic, albeit along feminist, rather than Jewish lines, than Esther? After all, her refusal to comply with the chauvinist behavior of her drunken husband and his friends is worthy of praise, not censure. So it is by no means surprising that a growing number of artists, such as Kirsten Coco (b. 1958), has focused on Vashti. A trio of Vashti oil paintings (Figs. 22a, b and c) emerged in 1998-99 as part of her Biblical Women series.15 The trio is accomplished in a realist style that recalls Phillip Pearlstein's work—and yet not, since Coco's distinctive palette is pale almost to the point where color (and therefore full naturalistic 'realism') is gone. One notes, in fact, that the single color that most consistently stands out is yellow. There is irony in this, perhaps: Vashti, the non-Jewish anti-heroine who is the necessary foil to Esther, is marked by a pale version of that color used by Christianity for centuries to mark the Jews as antithetical to the exalted hope and ambition of Christendom to become a kingdom of God. Vashti is placed, in each case—exploring different aspects of her brief presence in the story—in an ambience which seems both Oriental (the patterned pillows) and Western (the striped couch), ancient (the garments of the messenger) and contemporary (her overall mien, his overall mien). The scenes are drawn from the artist's imagination as much as from the text—so that they are indeed visual midrash. 'Anguish' (Fig. 22a) presumably follows the demand of her royal husband and yields the decision to refuse. 'Epiphany' (Fig. 22b) one might suppose conveys the arrival at that conclusion—as if a voice from within and without commands her to desist from fulfilling her husband's commandment, that voice insisting to her that there are more significant powers than his. And so the 'Messenger from God' (Fig. 22c) can be construed either as the definitive confirmation 15. There is a constantly growing body of work, primarily by Jewish American women artists, focussing on biblical women. Most of that work includes Esther, but much of it also includes Vashti, (re)presenting her along the lines of traditionally unheralded heroism; she stood up to the demands of her drunken husband and his rowdy friends, and paid the price for it. Among this art mention ought to be made of the Night Drawings series of Ruth Dunkell and the Biblical Masks of Suzanne Benton, in both of which bodies of work Esther and Vashti are found.

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of the validity of her decision or as the message of comfort that follows the exile (or worse) that will come or has come as a consequence of her refusal to accede to the king's wish. This last image completes a chain reaction of visual puns and ironic issues. The messenger offers her a rose and, thus, to eyes attuned to the Western artistic tradition, which for the past 16 centuries has been essentially a Christian tradition, recalls the arrival of the messenger/angel Gabriel into the chambers of the Virgin Mary to announce her immanent miraculous pregnancy. That annunciating angel often bears a lily in his hand, a symbol in Christian art of virgin purity. But that symbol, in turn, is verbally derived, as is much of the symbolism of 'Annunciation' scenes,7 from the Song of Songs and specifically its reference to the beloved as shoshanat ha-sharon. This phrase may be translated in two ways, since the botanical terminology of biblical Hebrew is not identical to that of modern English: 'lily of the Sharon' or 'rose of the Sharon'. In short, the lily and the rose are one and the same. Thus Vashti has, in her decision, become elevated to what in Christian art is a position reserved for the Virgin Mary. We have seen at the beginning of this discussion how the idea and image of Esther are appropriated by Christianity, where she is analogized to the Virgin Mary as a salvational intercessor. Coco has completed an extraordinary triangle: if Vashti is analogized to the Virgin, then she is analogized to Esther, since the Virgin and Esther are analogues of each other. Put otherwise, both women are, each in her own way, heroic, and both are symptomatic of the female capacity for heroic action in which one's own fate is pushed aside in favor of a principle or the need of the community at large.16 There is a further issue here, which places Coco's work into the broad question of'Jewish' art, also an issue raised toward the outset of this discussion. Among the consistent questions a Jewish artist in the Western world almost inevitably asks, at least in this century, is 'Where do I fit into

16. In the manner of intertextual midrash, one might go further. The rose—particularly a rare lily-white rose (such as Dante describes at the end of the Paradiso and Giotto depicts in the hand of the Virgin Mary with the Christ Child on her lap in a painting at the National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC)—is also associated with the Christ child; its thorns anticipate his martyrdom and specifically the crown of thorns forced on his head by the Romans in mockery of him as 'King of the Judeans'. In Coco's depiction, Vashti's rose might be seen as analogous: she will be sacrificed for her (feminist) convictions, and in opening the way for Esther, she indirectly makes possible the salvation of the Jews from Haman's intended genocide.

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the history of Western art, when that history, for the past 16 centuries, has been largely Christian art?' And the answer is variously given in diverse approaches to traditional Western visual imagery. One response is to wrestle with the triptych form, with its Trinitarian symbolism and its inevitable central image of the Crucifixion or the Virgin and Child. A range of Jewish artists in the second half of the twentieth century has deliberately created triptychs in which the astute viewer can observe an implied response to the question of fitting in.17 Given the fascinating turn offered by Coco to the meeting between the angel and Vashti (the transformation of a lily into its identical counterpart, the rose), then perhaps the fact of triptych form is not only a response to narrative need, but to that larger question as well. We have circled yet again toward the opening issues of this discussion. The significance of the book of Esther as the last book in the biblical canon, long left out because of the absence of overt divine presence within it; the first to address overtly the dangerous possibilities for Jewish life in the diaspora; the subsequent series of unusual aspects of the holiday derived from it and the modes of decorating it; the extraordinary place it holds in the Maranno world of Spain, Portugal and all of their New World dominions—all of this is echoed, albeit obliquely, by the Jewish problem of finding one's self in the art world at large. Coco's Vashti brought the matter of illustration and illumination together, along with the host of issues that that matter raises in the particular context of the Megillat Esther, as the twentieth century was drawing toward the twenty-first and the new millennium. 17. For example, Yaakov Agam's triptych, Tefillah (1965), or Barnett Newman's The Name II (1950). The first tells the viewer—but only the viewer who knows Hebrew—that the abstract work which changes configuration as one walks by it is a response to Christian triptychs. The title means 'prayer' and presents that act as an intermediary between us and the non-depictable, visually ungraspable God, in lieu of a figurative image of God in human form. The second, an all-white canvas divided into three parts, gives us simultaneously absence and totality of color (white), as God is visually absent but the author of the totality of reality. To a viewer aware of traditional Judaism, wherein God's name is only spoken in prayer, and otherwise rendered by the circumlocution DEH ('the Name'), Newman has explicitly informed us of his intention to portray without portraying God. This work, moreover, was done in the context of questions regarding God's presence or absence during the Holocaust, and regarding the artist's potential role for DI^U ]lpn (repairing the world) after that event. Newman's canvas puts everything back together on the microcosm of the canvas, with its eyecentering abstract unity.

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Figure la. West Wall and Torah Niche (Dura Europos) (Photograph by the author)

Figure Ib. Mordecai on White Horse, Led by Haman (Dura Europos) (Photograph by the author)

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Figure 2. Esther Megillah (Germany, c. 1300) (Courtesy of the Spertus Museum, Chicago)

Figure 3. Esther Megillah (Southern France, Sixteenth Century) (Courtesy of the Cecil Roth Collection, Oxford)

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Figure 4. Esther Megillah (Arye Loeb ben Daniel, Venice, 1748) (Courtesy of the Spertus Museum, Chicago)

Figure 5. Esther Megillah (Salom Italia[?], Italy, pre-1641) (Courtesy of the Spertus Museum, Chicago)

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Figure 6a. 'Washington Megillah' (Italy, Seventeenth—Eighteenth Century) (Courtesy of the Library of Congress, Hebraica Section)

Figure 6b. 'Washington Megillah' (Italy, Seventeenth-Eighteenth Century) (Courtesy of the Library of Congress, Hebraica Section)

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Figure 7. Esther Megillah (Franceso Griselini, 1743) (Courtesy of the Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC)

Figure 8. Esther Megillah (Germany, 1680) (Courtesy of the Spertus Museum, Chicago)

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Figure 9a. Esther Megillah (Germany, 1760, on parchment) (Courtesy of the Spertus Museum, Chicago)

Figure 9b. Esther Megillah (Germany, 1760, on parchment) (Courtesy of the Spertus Museum, Chicago)

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Figure 10. Esther Megillah (Alsace, Eighteenth Century) (Courtesy of the Spertus Museum, Chicago)

Figure 11. Esther Megillah (Alsace, 1730) (Courtesy of the Spertus Museum, Chicago)

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Figure 12. Esther Megillah (Morocco, Nineteenth Century) (Courtesy of the Spertus Museum, Chicago)

Figure 13 a. Esther Megillah (Kai FungFu, China, Nineteenth Century) (Photograph by the author)

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Figure 13b. Esther Megillah (Kai Fung Fu, China, Nineteenth Century) (Photograph by the author)

Figure 14. Esther Megillah and Case (Galicia, Poland, Eighteenth Century) (Courtesy of the Spertus Museum, Chicago)

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Figure 15. Esther Megillah and Case (Venice, Seventeenth/Eighteenth Century) (Courtesy of the Spertus Museum, Chicago)

Figure 16. Esther Megillah and Case (Bezalel Arts School, Jerusalem, 1927) (Courtesy of the Spertus Museum, Chicago)

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Figure 17a. Esther Megillah (Ze'ev Raban, Bezalel Arts School, Jerusalem) (Photograph by the author)

Figure 17b. Esther Megillah (Ze 'ev Raban, Bezalel Arts School, Jerusalem) (Photograph by the author)

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Figure 17c. Esther Megillah (Ze 'ev Raban, Bezalel Arts School, Jerusalem) (Photograph by the author)

Figure 18. Esther Megillah (Anonymous, Twentieth Century) (Photograph by the author)

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Figure 19. Wall Hanging (Sara Eydel Weissberg, Nineteenth Century) (Courtesy of the Collection of the Jewish Museum, NY)

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Figure 20. Micrograph (Hirsch Ilya Schlimowitz, Russia, 1870) (Courtesy of the Library of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America, NY)

Figure 21. 'Esther' (LeonardBaskin, c. 1975) (Courtesy of Gehenna Prints)

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Figure 22a. 'Anguish' (Kirsten Coco, 1998-99) (Courtesy of the artist)

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Figure 22b. 'Epiphany' (Kirsten Coco, 1998-99) (Courtesy of the artist)

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Figure 22c. 'Messengerfrom God' (Kirsten Coco, 1998-99) (Courtesy of the artist)

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THE ECUMENICAL ESTHER: QUEEN AND SAINT IN THREE WESTERN BELIEF SYSTEMS

Judith S. Neulander

The Biblical Esther The figure of Queen Esther belongs to a biblical tradition shared by Jews, Catholics and Protestants alike. Yet, from her origin in Near Eastern antiquity to her presence in Western modernity, Esther's cross-cultural journey has gone almost unresearched. To learn the secret of her crosscultural success, we will examine a representative selection of permutations in her story and in its modes of celebration, over time and across space. Our journey, like Esther's own, begins with her rise to the Persian throne in the royal city of Shushan. In a gloss of the Hebrew Scripture, the action begins when King Ahasuerus must replace the sitting queen, Vashti, whose conduct at court is seen as treacherous. The king is concerned only that the new queen be the most beautiful of women, therefore choosing Esther, unaware that she and her kinsman Mordecai—one of the king's courtiers—are Jews. But Haman, the king's jealous vizier, is well aware of the fact and cunningly secures the king's consent for a one-day slaughter of all Jews in the realm. Following local custom, the date is set by casting lots, which may account for the name of the Jewish holiday: 'Purim', probably derived from the Babylonian word for 'lots', puru (Gaster 1969: 833-34). Learning of the imminent massacre, Mordecai implores Esther to approach the king unsummoned and to touch his scepter for permission to plead on behalf of her people. Knowing that royal decrees are irreversible and that an unsummoned approach is punishable by death, Esther nevertheless agrees to make the appeal. After three days of solemn fasting, her appeal is successful and effects a classic reversal of fate: Haman is hanged on the gallows built for Mordecai, Mordecai becomes vizier, and the Jews are allowed to defend themselves for two days, thereby ensuring their victory over a Persian army commissioned to fight for one day only. Mordecai and

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Esther decree that these events should be commemorated annually on the fourteenth day of the Jewish month of Adar (which usually falls in March), at which time the story is read in synagogue and any mention of the name 'Haman' is drowned out by boisterous noise-making. Services are followed by a carnivalesque festival, including folk-plays, masquerading, consumption of alcohol and sweet desserts, and donations of food to the poor. The Esther Tale Type The folkloristic term 'tale type' refers to a group of stories that configure into a 'set' according to similarities in their plots. Variants belonging to the same tale type will hold in common a cluster of literary motifs; the term 'motif refers to the smallest element of a tale that is striking or unusual, and is found in more than one narrative (Thompson 1977: 415). 'Clothing', for example, is not a motif, but 'clothes produced by magic' is. Similarly, 'mother' is not a motif, but 'wicked stepmother' is. Largely because Esther appears in both Jewish and Christian sacred texts, the body of her traditional folk motifs are unidentified in Stith Thompson's Motif-Index of Folk-Literature (1955-58). However, to best understand the story's cross-cultural success, it is advisable to identify and work with the tale type to which it belongs. Therefore, since a tale type can be represented by the one motif that best represents all members in the 'set', I will describe Esther's tale type (subject to future refinement), as follows, noblewoman saves her persecuted people by successfully opposing injustice. (Compare this to Thompson's motif listing for the apocryphal Judith: 'Judith and Holofernes. K872: girl from enemy camp chosen to sleep with intoxicated general kills him in bed\) Since variants of Esther's tale type are found in earlier Babylonian and Persian traditions, some scholars suggest that the story of her triumph may derive from an older tradition commemorating the victory of the Babylonian pantheon over the rival gods of Elam (Ballman 1967: 556-57). According to this view, the chief Babylonian gods, Ishtar and Marduk, became Esther and Mordecai, while the names Vashti and Haman derive from Mashti and Humman, the principals of the Elamite pantheon (Fuerst 1975:38).

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Figure 1. Sassanian silver dish showing Ishtar, Lady of Heaven, seated on a feline throne, holding the sun and the crescent moon (Courtesy of Bison Books)

Also conforming to Esther's tale type, the royal concubine Phaidime appears in the Histories of Herodotus (3.67-79), in connection with the court at Susa. In this similarly genocidal palace intrigue, the throne is secretly taken by a murdering imposter, a Magus once wounded by Phaidime's father, Otanes. Otanes knew the Magus well, having cut off the villain's ears in an earlier confrontation. Just as Mordecai called upon Esther to touch the royal scepter, Otanes called upon Phaidime to touch the king's ears when he came to her bed. Like Esther, Phaidime knew her life was at stake, for if the king was indeed the earless Magus and she was caught feeling for the evidence, he would surely kill her. Nevertheless, she mustered the courage to follow through and managed without incident, thereby exposing the villain and saving her people from certain extinction. As was the case with Ishtar's triumph in Babylon, the anniversary of Phaidime's triumph became a red-letter day on the Persian calendar and was marked by an important festival. One or both of these celebrations perhaps contributed to the Hebrew variant. Whatever the origins of the Babylonian, Persian and Jewish traditions, and whatever their influence on one another, it appears that Iranians, Iraqis and Jews alike comprised a local population that adopted items of broad regional popularity into their own narrower traditions, each personalizing them in ways that helped to retain and fortify their own ethnic boundaries.

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Thus, Esther's cross-cultural success lies, at least in part, in the ability of her story to retain the bounded structure of its own tale type (that is, noblewoman saves her persecuted people by successfully opposing injustice), while allowing for an infinite number of changes to occur in the tale's negotiable traits; those aspects of a story that can change without violating its bounded structure (e.g. the names, nationalities, and religious practices of the tale's protagonists). As seen in the examples described above, personalization is more clearly a social device than an aesthetic impulse, for it changes the texts of cultural Others to promote the ideological and political positions that best serve the cultural Self. The Hebrew Esther text (the Megillah or Purim scroll) is a case in point. Dated by some scholars as late as 150 BCE, it underwent a subsequent personalization some 50 years later, when the Hebrew Scripture was translated into Alexandrian Greek by a group of approximately 70 Hellenistic Jews known as the Septuagint (LXX). Mention of God and prayer, so conspicuously absent from the biblical text, was added by the LXX, under whose specifically Alexandrian personalization Haman ceased to be one of the traditional archenemies of the ancient Hebrews, an Agagite or Amalekite (Est. 3.1), and instead became one of the traditional archenemies of the Alexandrian Greeks, a Macedonian (LXX Est. 16.10 [= Add. E.10]). Esther's story entered Christian tradition in the fourth century CE, when Saint Jerome translated her book into the official Latin version, taken in part from the Hebrew canon and in part from the LXX. Although Esther follows Ecclesiastes in the Hebrew Scripture, her book was paired with and placed after Judith in the Latin Vulgate, thereby classifying both Jewish tales as variants of the same Christian theme, Jewish heroines heralding a new faith as precursors of the Virgin Mary (notably, this theme cannot be classified as a tale type to which both narratives actually belong, since it is not reflected in any of their literary motifs). Paired with Judith in this way, Esther became part of a personalized Christian Old Testament, rearranged to better presage the advent of Christianity. As one Protestant scholar put it early in the twentieth century (Stearne 1907: xxii), The book [of Esther] is of value in shewing us the Jewish people in a state of preparation, albeit unconscious preparation, for the 'central event' in the world's history, the Incarnation of the Son of God...the Book of Esther recognized [the future by] prophetic instinct...

But the same text has not always met with Christian approval. The first to reject the book of Esther was Martin Luther, who proclaimed that parts

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of it filled him with such animosity he wished them out of existence (McMahon 1909: 550); whereupon the reactionary Council of Trent, meeting in April of 1546, canonized the Vulgate with the book of Esther fully intact (Durant 1957: 929). It was perhaps at this time that the Church first configured Esther as a precursor or sacred antecedent of the Virgin Mary, since it was at this time that she gained newly elaborate pomp and circumstance in Christian iconography and Church decor. Residents of Venice, or travelers there, will find an excellent example in the ceiling panels depicting her life at the Church of San Sebastiano, done by Veronese in 1556.

Figure 2. 'Esther Crowned by Ahasuerus ', by Veronese (1556) (Church of San Sebastiano, Venice) (Photograph by the author)

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Esther: Queen and Saint in the Old World and the New Once part of the Christian canon, Esther was quickly embraced as a Marian saint. As noted by the Encyclopaedia Judaica, 'Her intercession with Ahasuerus on behalf of the Jews was interpreted as a prefiguration of the Virgin's mediation [with God] on behalf of mankind' (Anonymous 1971: 911). Not surprisingly, then, it was along the Mediterranean coast of the 1500s, where veneration of the Virgin was strongest (Carroll 1989: 68, 71), that Esther would fluoresce into Spanish Catholic folklife as the Marian cult figure 'Santa Ester', first carried to the Americas by Spanish Catholic colonists. The Pontifical Lateran University's Bibliotheca Sanctorum is an encyclopedic compendium of Christian saints and their modes of veneration. Under 'Ester, regina, santa' ('Esther, queen, saint'), veneration of Santa Ester is cited in three branches of Catholicism, all Mediterranean (Spadafora 1991: 106). The first entry cites the Coptic tradition, a feast that takes place on 20 December with no mention of Mordecai; the second cites Greek Orthodox tradition, no date given, where Mordecai is included; the third cites Roman Catholic tradition as practiced in eighteenth century Venice on 1 July, when the Purim narrative unfolded (possibly represented by a procession of floats) 'with such vitality it was as if the brightly lit canals were actually transformed into the resplendent court at Susa' (Cannatal991: 110). Among other English-language references, St Esther can be found in H.G. Holweck's Biographical Dictionary of the Saints, where she is listed as: Ester (Hadassa), a relative of Mardochaeus; b. of Jewish exiles in Persia; selected to be queen of king Assuerus (Xerxes I, 479 B.C.) she saved her people from the evil designs of Aman, who had determined by lot the day of the murder of all Jews. In commemoration of this event, the feast of Purim (lots) was instituted. F. in Abyss. Cal. 20 Dec.-Buch-P.B. (24 May). (Holweck 1969: 330)

Above, the first part of Holweck's italicized abbreviation, F. in Abyss. Cal. 20 Dec., refers to Esther's Feast (F) on the 'Abyssinian' or Coptic calendar, on 20 December. The phrase that follows, -Buch-P.B. (24 May), is less decipherable. But it may be noteworthy that May is the moth consecrated to the Virgin Mary in Spain, while 23 May is a day on which Esther comes to prominence in Spanish Marian tradition.

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Under 'Saints of July', Esther appears on 1 July (given as her birth date and saint's day) in Omer Engelbert's classic Lives of the Saints (1994: 253-54), as follows: ST. ESTHER OR EDISSA Niece of Mardochai, who took Vashti's place as wife of Assuerus and was responsible for the death of a great number of enemies of the Jews (5th century B.C.).

Both Esther's sainthood and her Marian association find expression in Donald Attwater's Names and Name-Days, published by the Holy See, where she is described in connection with 'Our Lady, Stella Marts', an epithet used by mariners for the Virgin Mary (1939: 40): ESTHER (Estherd). From Persian satara, 'star'. Esther was the Jewish wife of the Persian king Ahasuerus who saved her people from massacre by Haman. A feast in her honor is kept by the Copts and Ethiopians on December 21. Our Lady as Star of the Sea would also be a suitable patroness for Esthers.

As indicated above, Esther's Catholic sainthood is well documented. However, while she appears in numerous hagiologies and calendars, she does not appear in all hagiologies and calendars. Thus, official canonization was apparently limited to the scriptural text, constituting a beatification, but not an actual canonization, of Esther herself. Therefore, her veneration as a saint lies clearly within the realm of Marian folk movements. On the European continent, folk movements devoted to the Virgin and her various apotheoses were most intensely concentrated in Italy and Spain, although her cults were curtailed everywhere during the Second Vatican Council of the 1960s, when limits were set on the extent to which Mary could be aggrandized (Carroll 1986: 10-11,220). Unlike Mary, however, Esther reached the pinnacle of her Catholic popularity in colonial times, thanks to the LXX, whose enhancement of her religiosity allowed the Council of Trent to canonize her book, and to cite her as a fitting role model for Christian women. But at the same point in time, and perhaps more significantly, indigenous peoples of the New World were increasingly seen as Lost Tribes of Israel (Eilberg-Schwartz 1990: 37-39). In this connection, Esther's reputation as an intercessor for Jews-at-risk was directly linked to the destiny of Indians-at-risk in the Spanish Americas, bringing her to the forefront of Spanish colonial awareness. Writing from Peru in 1629, for example, Friar Bernardino Cardenas petitioned financial support from Philip IV (reigned 1621-65) to educate

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native Peruvians 'just as it was when king Ahasuerus, for love of Esther, exalted the humble and the scorned, giving them favors and mercy' (1629: 266r). Clearly expressing the Spanish conflation of Mary with Esther, Cardenas begged the king to fund Andean education, saying, 'Do it Your Majesty, for love of Esther, she who is of your own beloved church, and for the love of the other most beautiful Esther, who is the Virgin Mary, wishing nothing more than the salvation of these poor Indian people' (1629: 267r). Friar Bernardino ended his plea by blaming his shortfall on a lack of'recompense from Your Majesty's vista ["custom house"]' (1629: 267r), a natural source of funding for local education. Unfortunately, Cardenas was unlikely to benefit from that quarter, for even if Philip had approved the request, corruption was endemic to the vistas and local graft was virtually uncontrollable. Nevertheless, in his heartfelt attempt to improve the quality of native Peruvian life, Cardenas successfully demonstrates the Spanish colonial conflation of Esther and Mary on both sides of the Atlantic. Esther in the Spanish Limelight Not surprisingly, Esther's popularity as a Spanish saint continued to blossom throughout the Counter Reformation, when entertainment joined art as a means to draw people to the Church. The greatest exponent of this phenomenon was the theatrical event (Sanchez Siscart 1992: 261), generating a vast array of 'Esther' dramas written by Christian literati. The origin of the art form is obscure, but there were clearly two strands of Iberian tradition: written works by known authors who date from the sixteenth to eighteenth centuries, and an oral, rhymed and largely anonymous folk tradition that is older and still persists. In both theatrical venues, personalization of the Esther text differs according to set literary patterns that distinguish Christian from Jewish authors (Fishlock 1955: 82-84). Elements such as Esther as a symbol of the Virgin, Ahasuerus as the Deity, allegorized references to Christian devotional poetry and homage of Jews to Christ typify Christian playwrights like Lope de Vega (who also echoed the spirit of the Christian Old Testament by linking Esther to Judith in the actor's dialogue). Conversely, Joao Pinto Delgado, a former Portuguese crypto-Jew living openly in France, wrote plays resembling those of Lope, but employed no elements of Christian drama. For example, Delgado also shows Esther emulating the illustrious women of her people, but, unlike Lope and other Christian

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authors, he makes no reference to Judith, who does not appear in the Hebrew canon; Delgado's work refers instead to Deborah and Yael, who do(Fishlock!955:95n. 1). Given the level of literacy required to write and perform these elaborate productions, and considering the cosmopolitan audiences they were written for, it is unlikely that any of these works were ever seen in rural Spanish villages or by indigenous peoples in the Spanish colonies. Instead, far-flung colonial populations drew from an oral tradition typically carried, reworked and disseminated by lay priests, most of whom came from Iberian villages where folk-plays, or aittos, were traditionally performed. Since oral traditions are not bound by rules that govern written composition, authors' names are rarely handed down, while the texts themselves are subject to ongoing personalization by any, and all, subsequent raconteurs. To ensure lasting life, however, oral traditions are entirely dependent on those rare and gifted redactors who give each story relevance in the context of their own times, without violating any story's timeless, bounded structure. Thus, any written record of an oral tradition is a fixed snapshot of an unfinished work in progress; a process of constant redaction that helps ensure longevity beyond that of most fixed (and more easily outdated) literary works. One such 'snapshot', an anonymous codicil, survives today in Madrid (Rouanet 1979). It contains 95 sixteenth-century folkplays, including one called Amany Mardoqueo, ovHaman andMordecai, the oral tradition most likely predating, as well as outliving, the written works of Lope and his literary colleagues. Santa Ester in the New World In colonial New Spain, transplanted Europeans imported the traditions held in their old hometowns and villages, including their pageants and plays. As Arthur Campa writes of New Mexico, 'there are two religious cycles in the New Mexican folk theatre, the [Christian] Old Testament cycle and the New Testament cycle built around the life of Christ' (1941: 127 [my italics]). Convinced that the New Testament was beyond the intellectual grasp of Jews, as well as that of their indigenous 'lost tribal' brethren, autos meant to Christianize native Americans were apparently taken from the Christian Old Testament. As Campa explains: The Spanish had their own presentations in connection with the celebration of Corpus Christi [New Testament] side by side with the religious plays intended for the Indians' beginning education. (1941: 127)

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The first one of these Indian autos to be given in the New World was the one of 'Adam and Eve' enacted in Mexico City in 1532. (1934: 8)

Although religious instruction helped Christianize New Mexican society, it did not succeed in democratizing it. Instead, New Mexico produced a stable indigenous underclass, stigmatized as an 'inferior' race and tagged for marginalization by a number of socially conditioned cultural distinctions, all of them rigidly enforced by a formally striated caste system (Bustamante 1989: 70-77; Gutierrez 1991:196-206; O'Crouley 1972:19). As Campa suggests, lines of ethnic distinction were apparently drawn, and social marginalization reinforced, by creating a Native American curriculum more heavily steeped in the Christian Old Testament than the New. Whether drawn from one or the other Christian texts, different autos were adopted by different villages across the Spanish-speaking world. Speaking parts were reserved for males, and became a matter of village pride, handed down from father to son. While we have no record of the full colonial repertoire, it is probably safe to assume that popular Esther plays were among those carried to the Spanish-speaking Americas. We do know for certain that on both continents autos were an integral part of festivals held for the great feasts and saints' days of the Church. Thus, in some places where village autos no longer survive but village festivals do, the figure of Santa Ester still prevails, both in Spain and in some of its former colonies. In the Spanish-speaking Philippines, for example, Esther appears in the annual 'Santacruzan', a celebration of the Holy Cross in honor of the Blessed Virgin, which takes place in May. The National Press Club holds an annual Santacruzan in Manila, while others are held in the towns of Pasig, Navotas, Malabon, Paranaque and Las Pinas. Below, clearly noting Esther's traditional relationship to Mary, a spectator explains: The procession is featured by pretty girls lavishly costumed, personifying Biblical characters.. .[including] Reina Esther, a queen whose presence in the line up does not seem to have any explanation except that she is said to be a precursor of the Virgin Mary. (Aliut 1969: 57-58)

Santa Ester in New Mexico New Mexico's now defunct fiesta de Santa Ester—supposedly a 'crypto-' or secretly Jewish tradition surviving from Inquisitory times—is more clearly a survival of the same Marian tradition imported to the Philippines and other Spanish-speaking colonies. Since the 1980s, a large number of

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Hispano folkways have been mistaken for 'crypto-Jewish' survivals by a small group of investigators, none of whom is a folklore specialist (Neulander 1996). Aware that crypto-Jews venerated Santa Ester, but apparently unaware that Catholics did the same, at least one sourthwestern Hispano has cited his local fiesta as proof of the crypto-Jewish past (Nidel 1984: 253-54). In order to make this claim, however, one must first be unable to identify the specific group that actually constitutes historical crypto-Jews, and one must also be unaware of the sensibilities that shaped their entire tradition (Neulander forthcoming). To clarify, it will help to turn for a moment to the summer of 1391, when anti-Semitic riots raged across the Spanish provinces of Castile, Catalonia and Aragon. Marauders invaded Jewish quarters, captured those unable to escape, and murdered those who refused baptism. According to J.H. Elliott, the number of Jews forcibly baptized may equal or even outnumber those who survived without being converted (1963: 104). Since contact was permitted between converses (Spanish for 'coverts') and their former Jewish communities, their underground practice was informed by normative rabbinic Judaism, and did not develop into an independent belief system. It was also short-lived, since parish priests were mindful that converse offspring be educated by the Church, and assimilated by marriage into the Christian mainstream. Hence, by 1415, Spain's 'Jewish' problem was unrelated to the events of 1391. Rather, the nation was reeling under the impact of roughly 50,000 spiritually empty, highly mercenary and entirely voluntary converts, known as 'marranos', the Spanish epithet for 'swine'. Over the years, rampant marranism could not be controlled by the Inquisition alone, hence in 1492 Spain expelled all Jews unwilling to convert, as well as all marranos unwilling to reform. The exiles fanned out across the safe spaces of the Middle East, North Africa, Europe and the Ottoman Empire, to build new lives unmolested by the Church. Ex-Jews who remained behind, and regretted converting to avoid expulsion, could not cohere as a community under Inquisitional scrutiny. Once again, local heresy departed from Jewish norms in mainly idiosyncratic or anecdotal ways, and once again it was short-lived, dying out—as it had in 1391—in less than two generations. By 1540, Judaizing heresies all but disappear from the Inquisitional record (Gitlitz 1996: 43). As Bodian writes of Castile, the heart of Spanish marranism, underground Judaism 'continued to live as a reality—with fateful consequences— mainly in the Spanish Catholic imagination (1997: 11). But this was not the case in Portugal. Forcibly converted in that 1497, and forbidden to

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emigrate, Portuguese converses might have followed the Spanish example but for two key distinctions. First, they were fortified by resolute Spanish refugees, a group willing to face great hardship rather than relinquish Judaism. Second, despite periodic mob violence, there would be no Inquisition in Portugal for almost 40 years, allowing the converts to cohere as a community, and identify as secretly Jewish. Thus driven underground, and religiously isolated for 300 years, the Portuguese alone developed an independent folk tradition of historic and ethnographic significance, known as 'secret-' or 'crypto-Judaism'. Hence, it is important to note that the founders of today's Hispano community first settled in New Mexico at the turn of the eighteenth century, and their origins trace directly to Catholic Spain, not to crypto-Jewish Portugal (Chavez 1975). Not surprisingly, firsthand accounts of New Mexico's now defunct fiesta are so different from the crypto-Jewish ritual that it seems Portuguese Esther traditions (like Pinto Delgado's Ester play) were personalized in direct opposition to Catholic models. We know, for example, that Catholic Marian festivals are traditional, communal celebrations that honor saints who personify the Virgin Mary, as well as the Virgin herself, sometimes including biblical figures and assorted luminaries of the Church. In these typically springtime festivals, women participate in a candle-lighting ceremony, after which celebrants form a procession (sometimes in lavish costume), in which banners and statues of those being honored are carried. This leads to a communal outdoor feast. Across the vast expanse of European Christendom, saints' days and other Church feasts have historically included celebratory treats and delicacies reserved for special occasions, including—for most of Europe's peasantry—meat pies, sausages and/or other savory meat dishes (Bakhtin 1984: 83, 184). In seemingly direct opposition, crypto-Jews chose to venerate Esther by reclusive non-participation in the public display, thereby emulating Esther's solemn retreat. Mindful of Esther's biblical three-day fast, and reflecting the legendary belief that she ate no meat at Persian court (b. Meg. 13a; Shulhan arukh, Orah hayyim 695.2), crypto-Jews maintained a solemn, indoor ayuno, or three-day fast, broken only at night with meals that were strictly meatless (Gitlitz 1996: 378-79). Fasting indoors for as long as three days, while abstaining from meat each night, is clearly unrelated to the one-day, fancily dressed, outdoor, meat-eating festivity of Spanish Catholic tradition. Hence, what remains to be seen is whether it was the solemn crypto-Jewish fast or the festive Catholic feast that prevailed in New Mexico, according to a firshand participant in the local celebration.

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The best known and fullest description of the event was recounted in 1984 by Clemente Carmona (Nidel 1984: 253-54), a lifelong particiant whom I interviewed in 1992. His account was consistent in both interviews and, whether his experience was recalled or invented, his narrative demonstrates knowledge of Catholic customs only; it lacks any evidence of contact with, or knowledge of, the crypto-Jewish tradition it is purported to be. Thus, as he had done previously for at least one other researcher, Carmona described a springtime holiday that reinforced women's traditional roles, where 'women lit candles to Santa Ester and other saints' (Nidel 1984: 253-54), after which celebrants formed an outdoor procession in which a bulto, or wooden statue, of Santa Ester was carried. According to Carmona, the Esther bulto held a hanging-rope in one hand and a crown in the other, weighing the danger of execution against the safety of royal immunity. I was not able to find any such image anywhere in New Mexico, but to preserve it, a retablo (the image of a saint painted on a wooden panel) was made at my request by Adam Alire, a young santero from El Rito, who in 1992 followed a pencil sketch of the Ester bulto made by Carmona in that same year.

Figure 3. Retablo of New Mexican Santa Ester, by santero Adam Alire (1992) (Photograph by the author)

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Having thus described the festivities, Carmona repeated his former claim that they culminated in an outdoor picnic—the feast consisting of traditional holiday empanadas, or savory meat pies (Nidel 1984: 253-54). Therefore, Carmona's firsthand description confirms that the festive, outdoor feast observed by Hispano Catholics is categorically unrelated to the solemn, indoor fast observed by crypto-Jews. Rather, his memory of the fiesta is consistent with Marian festivals native to Spain and carried to the Spanish Catholic colonies by Spanish Catholic colonists. The Living Santa Ester: Survivals in Catholic Spain

Figure 4a. Flanked by Salome (tambourine) and children carrying the anchor and crosses of Faith, Hope and Charity, a little Queen Esther appears in the Holy Week Procession, Valencia, 1999 (Photograph by Fernanda Barnuevo, Madrid)

Today, the Catholic Queen Esther no longer persists in New Mexico, but three strands of her past tradition endure on the Spanish Peninsula. In the newest strand, she is one of numerous Marian figures who survived the negative influence of Francisco Franco (dictator of Spain 1939-72), and the anti-Marian pressures brought by Vatican II in the 1960s. Thus, an adult Esther appears annually as part of Ahasuerus' court in Lorca's ornate Easter procession, while during Holy Week in 1999 a child Esther

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marched with four other girls in the maritime procession of the Hermandad del Santisimo Cristo del Salvador ('The Brotherhood of the Most Sacred Christ of the Savior') in Valencia. According to the festival's printed program, Semana Santa Mariner a de Valencia (Anonymous 1999b: 31), the tambourine carried by one girl is a symbol for Salome, while three other girls carried the crosses and anchor that locally symbolize Faith, Hope and Charity. Revealing her Christian identity, Esther carried a royal scepter, topped with a stylized crucifix—not only a Christian cultural marker, but a traditional emblem of the Spanish Catholic monarchy (Child and Colles 1971: 39).

Figure 4b. Costumed as the biblical Queen Esther, a Spanish child carries a scepter topped by a crucifix in the Holy Week Procession, Valencia, 1999 (Photograph by Fernanda Barnuevo, Madrid)

Santa Ester also persists as she once did on the village stage, played by a man and paired with Ahasuerus in the early auto tradition. Thus, the traditional male Esther, clad in gown, wig and mask, can still be seen in

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the Easter Week procession at Puente Genii, where the Queen's radiant beauty is symbolized by a hand-held mirror in a frame representing the rays of the sun.

Figure 5. The historical male Esther from the Holy Week Procession, Puente Genii, Spain, 1999 (Photograph by Fernanda Barnuevo)

The third and perhaps the most popular strand of Spanish 'Esther' traditions does not occur at Easter, but pairs Santa Ester with Santa Susana. The two were apparently linked in the mid-seventeenth century, based on the Roman legend of a Christian martyr named 'La Susana', not to be confused with the apocryphal Susanna who was leered at by the infamous elders. Spelled 'Susanna' in English, the Latin 'Susana' of Roman legend is assigned the saint's day of 11 August, and the Roman variant of her tale is found on this date in most hagiologies. But in Spanish Catholic tradition

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she is coupled with Santa Ester on 24 May, the month consecrated to the Virgin in Spain. The Roman Susana was destined to be popularized and linked to Esther in an auto rewritten by the French priest Adrien Jourdan in 1653 (Coffey 1942: 22). In the original Latin tragedy, Susana was a secretly Christian noblewoman who had pledged herself to be a bride of (or queen to) Christ. On that basis, she denied the Emperor Diocletian's demand that she marry his nephew, Caesar Galerius, and like all Christian martyrs she paid for her faith with her life. However, in his popular play Jourdan introduced a central motif from the book of Esther, allowing Susana's breech of royal protocol to spare her fellow Christians, just as Esther and Phaidime's breeches of royal protocol came to spare their respective peoples. But Spanish speakers may have aligned Susana with Esther according to a more obvious parallel, a feat of onomastic wordplay introduced by Jourdan, although perhaps inadvertently. Whatever his intent, the French author linked Susana to Esther in semantic association with the name 'Shushan', which is given as Susan in Latin, as in Spanish. This renders Esther herself la Susana, the feminine for 'Susanite' (or 'Lady of Susa') in all forms of written and spoken Spanish. Hence, by reworking Hebrew literary motifs into the legend of a Christian heroine known as la Susana, the French author achieved a Spanish play-on-words—one that not only linked the two noblewomen in Spanish folk imagination, but also logically cast the Roman 'Lady of Susa' as a latter-day incarnation of her ancient Hebrew predecessor. He thereby riveted popular imagination with an already proven plot and, at the same time, reinforced the Christian tenet that the Hebrew Bible foretells the Christian future. Given this powerful legitimation of Christian belief, it is no wonder that Jourdan's heroine found her place among Spanish Marian saints and became Santa Susana, paired with Santa Ester. Easy to spot in the most popular and widely distributed of Spanish almanacs (e.g. Almanaque el Firmamento [Anonymous 1999a: 45]), the two Marian saints still share 24 May as their mutual saint's day, cited as Santas Susana y Ester, reinas ('Saints Susana and Esther, queens'). Today, the old Spanish autos are all but forgotten, while the former Marian festivals show no sign of resurgence in Spain. But, frequently paired with Judith, Esther and Susana still persist in surviving Marian festivals, a tripartite sisterhood linked in local tradition as apotheoses of the Virgin Mary. As late as September of 1980, Maria Angeles Arazo described the annual 'Procession of the Mother of God', held in Algemesi, La Ribera Alta, recording a colorful proliferation of martyrs and saints,

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'priests, prophets, kings, apostles, evangelists', and so on, going on to say (Arazo and Jarque 1980: 210, 212): The procession overwhelms the senses. The streamers, the little First Communion girls, the biblical personages...beautiful women symbolizing... Judith, Esther and Susana.

Esther in American Jewish Modernity

Similarly pleasing to the eye and often tickling to the funny-bone, the German Jewish Purimspiele ('Purim play') first appeared in the late sixteenth century. The burlesque folk play gained wide admission among the Ashkenazim, or Western and Eastern European, Jews. But this was not simply an outgrowth of popular street theater, or of Esther's popularity on the Christian stage. Rather, the custom may have gained a ready Jewish embrace because staged performances permit what James Scott calls a 'subtle use of codes', inserting into patterns of dress, dance, speech, gesture, song and story, politically subversive meanings that can be made intentionally transparent to an oppressed people and intentionally opaque to its oppressors (1990: 158).

Figure 6. 'Purim Players', Holland, 1657 (Courtesy of Crown Publishers)

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It is therefore noteworthy that most Christians in late sixteenth/early seventeenth century Europe belonged to the lower classes and were themselves socially and politically disenfranchised. Given these circumstances, the continent was predictably rife with popular rhetoric and public displays reversing fate and fortune, gender and species, status and rank, propriety and privilege. Such themes were found in broadside caricatures of The World Upside Down (or The Topsy Turvy World), also celebrated in satirical songs, millennial visions, street fairs, carnivals and folk plays. Under such conditions, incorporation of a subtly coded burlesque into the Purim celebration refers us back to the original appropriation of Mesopotamian carnival as Purim's celebratory format (Craig 1995: 162-63; Gaster 1950: 12-13; Schauss 1938: 268). That is, like the ancient carnival, approved of and sheltered by the dominant Mesopotamian culture, the staged burlesque would have given Europe's oppressed Jewish community a safe means to animate a day of Jewish triumph—a means to turn the world upside down, but this time using the cultural raw materials approved of and sheltered by Christendom itself.

Figure 7. 'An American Jewish Esther with face paint, crown and fairy wand', Bloomington, IN, 1999 (Photograph by the author)

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Today, the synagogue folk play remains a stable feature of Purim festivities in the United States, as do children's masquerades. Elements of Purim's ancient political subterfuge are neither recalled nor expressed and regional costuming is heavily Anglo-American. In 1999, for example, at the Jewish Community Center in Bloomington, Indiana, face-painting was in vogue, as it was for children at most secular American festivals. Here, too, a little American Jewish Esther replaced the royal scepter with a magic wand from fairyland. Historically, fairylore was a traditional British regulator of proper Christian behavior (the best avoidance of fairy mischief was timely baptism, as well as signing the cross at appropriate times and places, etc.). Similarly influenced, five Sunday School friends who decided to be 'evil' together appeared as two Hamans and three Vashtis, all dressed in black, black being the traditional Northern European emblem of the demonized ethnic Other (Lindow 1955: 13, 18). In keeping with evil emblems of the British Isles, one of the three Vashtis was dressed as a Halloween witch, a demonic figure borrowed from the ancient Celtic new year.

Figure 8. 'Children appearing as two Hamans and three Vashtis, all in black', Bloomington, IN, 1999 (Photograph by the author)

There is no doubt that most, if not all, community members were unaware of the Christian and pre-Christian traditions reflected in some of their costuming, which now reflects a modern Jewish personalization of secular American symbols popularly used for good and evil.

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Like traditional Jews, who see themselves as sole inheritors of the covenantal promises, the Anglo-American founding fathers saw themselves as a new Israel, specifically chosen to create a new Promised Land in the North American wilderness. Given this religiously charged worldview, they were strongly predisposed, as Sacvan Bercovitch writes, to 'discover America as a believer unveils scripture' (1981: 6). As a result, the Protestant Old Testament continually supplied its followers with sufficient metaphors to sacralize the expanding American landscape, as the growing nation secured its modern borders. By the nineteenth century, the tendency to draw parallels between sacred events in the Old Testament and mundane (or profane) events on the modern American mainland would admit at least one courtier from ancient Susa into the Protestant mainstream. Historically, it was the evil Haman, not the noble Esther, who made the transition. Hanged for choosing to undo his rival, the biblical villain shares this mode of execution with other fellows similarly hanged in the most widely known of Anglo-American ballad-types, The Jealous Lover. But the parallel was not close enough to admit the jealous vizier to the brotherhood of lovers forced to face the gallows in traditional ballads. The motif that finally forged the link was 'reversal of fortune', drawn from a scandalous tabloid crime in which romance itself was the game of chance, the hero became the villain, and all was lost in the 'lottery' of love. The event took place in January of 1820, when Amasa Fuller entered Anglo-American ballad tradition by striding into the Laurenceburg (Indiana) office of Palmer Warren and shooting Warren dead for winning the affections of his bride-to-be. The excerpt below is from a variant sung in Maine, but variants were also sung throughout New England as well as the midwest and the southwest, where Fuller and Warren (also known as The Indiana Hero) was a 'bunkhouse favorite' of American cowboys (A.B. Friedman 1956: 205-206): He was handsome in deportment, comeleye and fair, A brave hero as ever was known; But I'm sorry to say, instead of his wedding day, Poor Fuller lies silent in his tomb. Young Fuller in a passion of love and anger flew, And Minnie began for to cry; But with one fatal shot, he killed Warren on the spot, And smiling says 'I'm ready now to die'.

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Young Fuller was condemned by the honorable board, Of Laurenceburg to die; That enormous [sic: ignominious] death, to hang above the earth, Like Haman on the gallows so high. Come all you young married men that's got a prudent wife, Be loving, be honest, be kind; You may look through Judges, Genesis, Samuel, Kings and Jews, And the truth of my story you will find, That marriage is a lottery, and few that wins the prize, That's pleasing to the heart and eye; But those that never marry is said to be the wise— Now, ladies and gentlemen—good-bye!

It seems only reasonable that Esther, above all a symbol of redemption from oppression and a Catholic apotheosis of the Virgin Mary, would play a somewhat diminished role in a strong Protestant hegemony void of Marian cults. Yet, Jewish immigrant groups, and the Spanish Catholics who came before them, were not alone in venerating her in the United States, where she now retains a deep and abiding meaning for at least one church on the margins of mainstream Protestantism. As if to uphold the French colonial sneer that America had 'only two sauces' but a multiplicity of home-grown faith communities (Szasz 1988: 87), the eclectic Spiritual Churches of New Orleans are built upon Protestant Holiness and Pentecostal models, also reflecting influence from Catholic, Vodou and Native American traditions. The Spiritual Churches celebrate a number of annual feasts to honor Christian saints as well as other heroic figures, invoking their spirits as personal guides. Queen Esther is but one in a hierarchy of spirit guides, led by the Native American hero Black Hawk. However, in the Queen Esther Divine Temple of the Spiritual Church, where the full title 'Queen Esther' is a proper name given to children, Esther is the leading spirit guide, and she is venerated all year long. Church members, two thirds of whom are African-American women, adhere to the basic celebratory format of other Spiritual Churches, but with a different emphasis. Services are run by women, and, as Claude Jacobs and Andrew Kaslow write, 'a feminist theme predominates, although it is sometimes developed into a more general statement regarding the position of blacks in America' (1991:120). When Esther's annual feast is celebrated, women in the Queen Esther Divine Temple light pink and white candles, reflecting American color-coding for femininity and purity.

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Figure 9. 'Pink and white candles on the altar of the Queen Esther Divine Temple' (Photograph by Michael P. Smith, New Orleans [e-mail: [email protected]])

As in Jewish and Catholic contexts, costuming is used. Presiding churchwomen dress in pink robes, while the minister who animates Esther's spirit wears a regal tiara and an ornate pink and white gown, carrying a scepter when leading the service (Estes 1993: 162).

Figure 10. 'Presiding Churchwomen robed in pink in the Queen Esther Divine Temple' (photo by Michael P. Smith, New Orleans [e-mail: [email protected]])

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As a personalized spirit guide and female role model, Queen Esther clearly provides leadership options for Spiritual churchwomen who have left denominations that allow only male ministers. But at the same time, Esther appears to have broader, community-wide appeal according to the tale's enduring bounded structure; that is, as a member of a persecuted people who successfully opposed injustice. Conclusion As we have seen, the ancient Mesopotamian noblewoman has prevailed across cultures, from remote antiquity into our own time. The secret of her cross-cultural success seems to lie in the most stable aspect of any tale carried in oral tradition: its ability to adapt, over time and across space, to the personalized needs of highly distinct peoples. Rather than an artistic impulse, skilled personalization seems to function as a social device, helping to hold cultural boundaries, to fortify group identity, and (as in New Mexico) to marshal symbols for racial or ethnic identity-switching. For any tradition to succeed cross-culturally, it must give perfect expression to the transcendent past, while giving equally perfect expression to the grounded present; the nexus of creative heat in skilled tradition-bearing (Neulander 1998: 232). Thus, personalized by different groups in different circumstances, over time and across space, Esther prevails essentially unchanged. A timeless model of feminine strength, integrity and courage for members of diverse racial, religious and ethnic communities, she is with us still in the foothills of the twenty-first century—no mere artifact of ancient Near Eastern memory, but an ecumenical queen and saint in three Western belief systems.

READING A TEXT BACKWARDS: THE BOOK OF ESTHER AND NINETEENTH-CENTURY JEWISH AMERICAN INTERPRETATIONS

Scott M. Langston

The traditional starting point for biblical interpretation has been the text. Typically, one begins with it (in this case, not necessarily its canonical version) and then moves forward from the ancient period and circumstances that produced the final form. Usually, the study of modern interpretations and uses of the text lies somewhat removed from the effort to understand the text itself and may even be considered irrelevant for this pursuit. However, reading a text backwards, that is, beginning, instead of ending, with the modern interpretation and/or use, can serve as a tool to enhance not simply our understanding of the period that produced the interpretation, but of the text itself. Such an approach reveals ideas present in a text that can get lost in the pursuit of other matters. It uncovers the cracks in a text that allow these readings to flow forth. This is the case with the book of Esther and its appropriation by American Jews of the nineteenth century. The story of American Jews during the nineteenth century is a story, in part, of diaspora. During this century, the Jewish population increased dramatically as immigrants came in a series of waves. One significant movement of German Jews began in the mid-1830s and continued into the 1850s. Estimates vary regarding how many Jews from Central Europe immigrated between 1820 and 1870, but a figure around 100,000 does not seem inordinate. By the 1880s, East European Jews were pouring into America. Over the next four decades, roughly two million traveled to the United States (J.R. Marcus 1989-93: II, 16-21; IV, 16). After arriving on American shores, Jews found a land of promise and threat. While they experienced more freedoms and opportunities than they previously had, these immigrants also confronted serious threats to their identity as Jews. The process of disintegration and integration confronted the Jewish community as both inner and intra-group processes. Jews had to come to grips

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with what it meant to be Jewish in America and to be an American who was Jewish. In attempting to address these issues, three Jewish authors, Rabbi Isaac L. Leucht, Dr Kaufmann Kohler and Mrs Annie Jonas Moses, found guidance in the book of Esther. While scholars have debated the merits of the book and questioned its inclusion in the canon as well as its historical reliability, others have found a paradigm for dealing with diasporas of all sorts. The book beckons those in diaspora to find a way in their potentially hostile environment to maintain and alter their life-giving identity. How does one remain faithful and alive? How does one embrace the new without forsaking the old? How does one embrace the old without alienating the new? The book of Esther allowed the American Jewish community to probe these issues and to devise answers that at times conflicted. Although Esther, according to Timothy Beal (1997: 5), was treated as 'the most remote outpost in the Old Testament colony' by the colonial discourse of Christianity, Jews living in America during the nineteenth century found this outpost to be essential to their survival. Persians in Appearance, but Jews in their Hearts In July 1883, Rabbi Isaac L. Leucht published an article in the Southern Presbyterian Review entitled 'The Mysteries of the Book of Esther'. The forum wherein the article was published, as well as its dedication to the Reverend Dr H.M. Smith, pastor of New Orleans' Third Presbyterian Church and editor of the journal, reflected much of Leucht's understanding of the book's implications for Jewish life in America.1 While seeking to 1. The circumstances surrounding Leucht's dedication of his article to Reverend Smith illustrate some of the dynamics in Jewish efforts to maintain identity while relating to Christian society. Two months prior to the publication of his article, one of Leucht's children had died. Approximately one week after the child's death, a special meeting of the board of Touro Synagogue was held to discuss the circumstances surrounding the child's funeral. The funeral had been held in Leucht's home. Reverend Smith was present and even 'read the funeral psalm' and spoke 'otherwise as an officiating minister'. This created much controversy among some of the synagogue's members. A resolution was made to prefer charges against Leucht 'for his action in inviting a Christian [sic] minister to officiate at the late funeral of his child & that this action be considered a gross insult to every member of this congregation'. After a long debate, the resolution was withdrawn, but an invitation was issued for Leucht to appear before the board to explain his actions. A week later, Leucht explained his actions, 'citing numerous comments from books considered authorities on Jewish law & precedents where Christian [sic] ministers officiated at the funeral of Jews & showed to

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defend the book of Esther as 'a sacred inheritance', Leucht found within the story certain elements that addressed the Jewish dilemma in the United States. The rabbi used the book as a model for Jewish life in the United States, an explanation for centuries of Jewish persecution and an avenue to address American Christians. Having emigrated from Darmstadt in 1864 at the age of 20, Leucht, a Reform Jew, first served as assistant rabbi at the Fell's Point Congregation in Baltimore, Maryland. In 1868, he moved to New Orleans to become the assistant rabbi to James K. Gutheim, first at congregation Gates of Mercy and then at Temple Sinai. Gutheim was arguably the most important rabbi of southern Reform Judaism during the nineteenth century. In 1879, Leucht became the rabbi of Gates of Mercy, which later merged with another congregation (Dispersed of Judah) in order to form the Touro Synagogue. He remained Touro's rabbi until his death in 1914 (Langston 2000: 111). During his nearly 50-year career in New Orleans, Leucht distinguished himself by his ability to interact with the non-Jewish population of the city while still maintaining a distinctive Jewish identity. His reading of the book of Esther reveals how he managed to negotiate the various boundaries he encountered. Admitting that the book had been considered for centuries 'a stepchild in the sacred family' of Scripture, the rabbi noted that it remained 'dear to every one whom the waves of materialism or atheism have not strangled in their poisonous embrace' (Leucht 1883: 588). Writing for a Protestant publication, Leucht did not define the book as a strictly Jewish production addressed to an exclusively Jewish audience. Materialism and atheism constituted equal threats to Jews and Christians alike. The rabbi, therefore, engaged his Christian audience by incorporating them as allies against secular enemies. He did not try to interpret Esther solely within the confines of Judaism. This strategy allowed Leucht to address Christians in much the same way as Esther addressed Ahasuerus. Leucht (1883: 589-91) believed the book reflected a historical incident. He identified Ahasuerus with Xerxes, son of Darius, and described the Persian king as 'a cowardly, cruel, and self-indulgent tyrant' who ordered the Board that in no wise has Jewish law & custom been violated by his action'. The board exonerated Leucht especially in light of the fact that he had attempted to conduct the service, but broke down, and in the absence of any other Jewish minister, had asked Smith to perform the service (Touro Synagogue Collection, volume 57, Minutes of Board of Officers, 20 and 27 May 1883, Special Collections, Tulane University Library, New Orleans, Louisiana).

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the murder of his own subjects while in a drunken state. Many critics, however, had categorized the book as 'a mere romance' because none of the post-exilic prophets ever mentioned Esther or Mordecai. Leucht wondered how such a magnificent event could not provoke some comment by Ezra, Nehemiah, Daniel, Ezekiel, Jeremiah, 'the Second Isaiah', or the authors of the exilic and post-exilic psalms? This silence provided the rabbi with a key to understanding the actions of Esther and Mordecai and enabled him to find a paradigm for managing dual identities as Jews and Americans. Leucht believed that the exilic experience had created two parties or groups among the surviving Jews. Most fell into utter despair, replacing Yahweh with the gods of Babylon. Many gave up all hope of ever returning to their homeland. A small minority, however, 'remained true to Jehovah, and could not bear the idea of living without Jerusalem'. This minority, among whom the prophets were found, remained convinced that the Messiah would return to restore Israel to their inheritance. Accordingly, 'all their thoughts and feelings, all their dreams and hopes, concentrated upon Jerusalem'. Those of the first group attempted to form a spiritual-political alliance with the nations wherein they lived. Some adopted the religion of their new hosts; others remained true to Yahweh, although they ceased to be 'Jewish enthusiasts'. These people became citizens of their respective countries and proved themselves indispensable to their governments by their 'shrewdness, learning, and general adaptability'. In contrast to the prophets, Mordecai and Esther included themselves among those Jews who focused on life within their new nations. Given their stress on the restoration of Jerusalem, the prophets could not speak favorably of Mordecai and Esther. They could not uphold these two as 'types of Jewish manhood and womanhood'. Rather than criticize them, the prophets remained silent (Leucht 1883: 591-95). Leucht found in Mordecai and Esther paradigms teaching how Jews in diaspora could successfully maintain their dual identities. According to him, 'No doubt they were all good Jews in their hearts, but Persians in appearance'. As a guiding principle, they submitted to everything with the exception of extermination. Thus, Mordecai could justify the marriage of Esther to a 'heathen', as well as the casting aside of the Mosaic dietary laws, in order to attain a greater good for the Jewish people (Leucht 1883: 594-95). One can read in Leucht's interpretation the dilemma confronting, and the responses made by, nineteenth-century American Jews. In one sense, the book of Esther in its canonical context depicted the tensions within

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American Judaism. Just as the prophets' manner of dealing with diaspora differed from that of Mordecai and Esther, so too did American Jews find varying ways to negotiate their status as Americans and Jews. Leucht (1883: 595) wondered, 'How could these patriotic enthusiasts, or enthusiastic patriots [i.e. those who returned to Judah] glorify a man or woman [i.e. Mordecai and Esther] who held convictions the very opposite of their own?' The prophets looked with 'inexpressible disdain' on those who no longer hoped for a rebuilt Zion. A similar division existed within the American Jewish community between those who viewed the United States as the land of promise and those who had begun to look to Palestine. Most Reform Jews believed that in America they could fulfill their destiny as a spiritual nation while participating as citizens of a non-Jewish political nation (Meyer 1988:227). Assimilation into American society became an important component to achieving success, although American Jews disagreed over the acceptable degree of assimilation. Advocates of Zionism (or proto-Zionism), however, looked to the re-establishment of a Jewish political nation as a necessary ingredient to fulfill their mission as a people. The American Hebrew, in an editorial on 17 December 1880, urged maintaining hope for a Jewish political nation. It reasoned, 'It is no disrespect to the constitution, to believe that at some time there will be a Jewish nation established in Palestine'. Indifference to this principle could be linked to 'that genius of compromise which has in other cases proven so destructively fateful'. Those who sought to strengthen Judaism 'by legalizing infractions of its law' had engendered indifference to Jewish national aspirations. As the two groups came to different conceptualizations of Jewish identity, particularly in relation to American citizenship, their relations were often strained. Leucht's portrayal of the struggles within post-exilic Judaism paralleled those of his own community. The conflict manifested itself between Leucht and another New Orleans rabbi, Max Heller, in part over the issue of Zionism. While Zionism did not begin to flourish significantly in the United States until the 1890s, it had received increasing attention among Jews during the 1880s, especially after the Russian pogroms of 1881-82 (J.R. Marcus 1989-93: IV, 645). Leucht was an ardent anti-Zionist. In a newspaper article published in the New Orleans Daily Picayune in 1904, Leucht said, 'I am also an antizionist of the most pronounced type, believing that a Jew must work out his destiny in the community in which he lives, suffering, as he goes along, through the ordination of Providence, as an example which will later on bring about the reign of love and benevolence'. To him, Zionism was an 'outgrowth of despair' (Leucht 1904).

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Heller, who replaced James K. Gutheim as Temple Sinai's rabbi in 1887, adopted a different position. In an unusual stance for a Reform rabbi, Heller publicly espoused Zionism in 1901. He believed that American Jews had assimilated too much and made Occidentalism into an idol. Zionism, on the other hand, formed an integral component in the fulfillment of Judaism's mission (Malone 1997: 109,122,137). The two leaders of New Orleans' Reform community, therefore, reflected differing opinions on the expression of Jewish identity. The book of Esther offered fertile ground for the consideration of Jewish identity in America. Modern scholars of Esther have pointed out that the book lends itself to definitions of 'us' and 'them', self and other (Beal 1997: 2). This understanding usually identifies the self and other as Jew and Gentile. Leucht's reading of the book against its broader postexilic background, however, made the identification of self and other an intra-group exercise. Reform Jews supportive of assimilationist ideals and anti-Zionist sympathies formed the self, while those opposed to such ideas constituted the other. Jew and Gentile, at this point, did not enter into the primary formulation of identity. Instead, the Gentile stood at the edges of the discussion, almost in the background. This group still played a role, but for the moment it receded. The book of Esther became for Leucht a useful tool for categorizing Jewish responses to diaspora. As Jews debated their relationship to Gentiles, Leucht highlighted in Esther a means by which to legitimate assimilationist and anti-Zionist ideas. While the majority of post-exilic leaders mentioned in the Bible sought a return to Palestine and disdained the embracing of Gentile ways, they did not speak against Mordecai and Esther. This silence essentially legitimated those American Jews who sought to be Jews in their hearts, but Persians in appearance. The rabbi, therefore, defined two ways of forming the boundaries between Jew and Gentile. The boundary reflected by the post-exilic 'Zionists' appeared to be somewhat rigid. It demarcated Jewish identity geographically, politically and socially. That reflected by Mordecai and Esther proved to be somewhat fluid. Jewish identity did not necessarily depend on geographic, political or social distinctions, but was intertwined with those factors. For Leucht, the book of Esther illustrated how Jews might legitimately cross the boundaries between themselves and Gentiles. The boundaries appear to have been flexible in his understanding. This does not mean that the rabbi advocated a total masking of Jewish identity. Rather, he envisioned a fluid process of alternating between identities of self and other. At times, little or no distinction might exist between Jews and Gentiles as

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Americans. At other times, however, great distinctions might arise. Submitting to everything except extermination meant fully embracing American culture and society up to the point of losing Jewish distinctiveness. Leucht (1904) best expressed this idea when he proclaimed, 'I am a Jew, and yet am a Protestant and also a Catholic, for I always protest against anything that opposes light and progress, and I am universal in my belief in the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man'. He could be both self and other in American society because the United States, unlike many other countries, facilitated this mode of expression. For Leucht, the theoretical separation of religion and state made possible a dual identity as self and other even in the face of a society that often associated Christianity with 'Americanness'. How the rabbi understood the American Jew as self and other can be seen in two events that occurred in 1882, the year prior to Leucht's publication of his article on Esther. A rally was organized in New Orleans in March of that year to protest the Russian pogroms against Jews that had commenced in 1881. The rally had a thoroughly Christian flavor as four speakers addressed the crowd from Christian and American perspectives. The Reverend H.M. Smith, to whom Leucht was to dedicate his article on Esther, served on the committee that composed resolutions denouncing the pogroms and urging support of the Jews. The speakers denounced the pogroms largely on the basis of their violation of the principles of Christianity and America. Leucht responded to the rally in a sermon given a few days later and reprinted in Smith's Southwestern Presbyterian. Briefly stated, he argued that Jews bore the primary responsibility for solving the 'Jewish question'. Rather than bringing up children as merchants and therefore feeding fears that Jews would one day control the world, Jews ought to train their children in other trades. This, in turn, would increase the likelihood of young men succeeding financially and also encourage them to marry and create Jewish households. As the foundation of Judaism, Jewish families played important parts in the survival of the race. Leucht identified three steps Jews could take: 'Open new avenues to our children, raise them to be useful members of mankind, and supporters of the household of Jacob. Only then will we be able to remove the prejudice of our neighbors and blot this Jewish question from our midst' (Leucht 1882a). Much like Mordecai and Esther, Leucht believed that the best hope for Jewish survival was their willingness to join Gentiles in society. Just as Mordecai and Esther had become citizens of their country and proved themselves indispensable to their government, so should American Jews

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become 'useful members of mankind'. He believed that 'new avenues' had been opened to Jews in the United States, asserting that in America 'no one throws an obstacle in our way' (Leucht 1882a). By traversing these 'new avenues', the Jewish other would become the American self. As useful members of American society, the 'otherness' of Jews would cease to be a major factor. Yet embracing the American self did not mean giving up the Jewish other. The third plank of his strategy consisted of raising children to be 'supporters of the household of Jacob'. Jews must signal their American identity by acting in ways useful to their nation, but this did not necessitate the abandonment of their Jewish distinctives. In fact, it necessitated the strengthening of them. Jews, therefore, became active agents in the development and maintenance of their dual identities, rather than passive victims of persecution. Mordecai and Esther modeled this response. Their assimilation into Persian society did not reflect a surrendering of Jewish identity, but an aggressive defense of it. A few weeks after the rally in support of Russian Jews, a league devoted to encouraging better sabbath observance was formed by many of the Christian ministers of New Orleans. While the league had a strongly Christian character, both Leucht and Rabbi Gutheim participated in it. Leucht even challenged his congregation to become involved as 'our sacred duty'. He took the opportunity, however, to warn against the passing of a Sunday law that would enforce the Christian sabbath. Nationally and statewide there had been growing support of such a law. While most Americans associated Christianity with the nation, Leucht used his participation in the sabbath league to demonstrate and protect Jewish ideals on the basis of American ideals. He argued, again in a sermon reprinted in the Southwestern Presbyterian, that 'The great blessing of this country—the great boon of the United States is that Church and State are separated forever, and anything that might be construed to enforce a religious precept, must be condemned, as endangering the freedom of the individual'. Furthermore, he did not advocate a law that privileged the Jew in the observance of their sabbath. He contended, 'We [i.e. Jews] are—and must be in the eyes of the law—nothing but citizens of the United States, with equal burdens and equal rights'. In this way, Jews could use their status as Americans, or self, in order to protect their status as Jews, or other (Leucht 1882b; Langston 2000: 112-18). Rabbi Leucht realized the threats that confronted all Jews, including those living in the United States, by virtue of their status as non-Christians. Jewish history taught him that persecution could break out at any moment. The book of Esther aided him in explaining his people's history

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of suffering. According to him, the book 'has been the key-note to all the persecution of the Jews which since its date has taken place'. He noted that currently in Russia and Prussia, 'the Hamans speak to their Ahasuerus'. Once again, Leucht found in one of the enigmas of the book, the absence of God or anything religious, the interpretive key. Believing that the book manifested the idea of a governing providence, he proceeded to explain the success of Mordecai and Esther from this perspective. Yet, why then would God never be mentioned? This absence, in his opinion, actually argued for the book's authenticity. Living in a country that advocated the worship of gods other than the God of Israel, Jews could not openly or aggressively worship their God. To do so would have brought sure extermination. Not only did the Babylonians and Persians prohibit such worship, but a powerful 'Know-Nothing' party only begrudgingly allowed the Jews to serve in the Persian government. This party sought an opportunity to rid the kingdom of Jews. Haman represented the Know-Nothing Party in Persia (Leucht 1883: 597-604). Leucht's reference to the Know-Nothing Party alluded to an American political party. During the mid-nineteenth century in the United States, several societies open only to native-born Protestants helped form the American Party or the Know-Nothing Party. The party's name derived from the secrecy reflected in its members' reluctance to answer questions about their beliefs. Members usually responded to such questions by saying, 'I know nothing'. One of their main goals was to reduce the influence of foreign-born voters, who usually voted Democratic. Abraham Lincoln, writing in a letter dated to 1855, described the party by observing that, 'When the Know-Nothings get control, it [i.e. the Declaration of Independence] will read "all men are created equal, except negroes, and foreigners, and catholics"'. By 1860, the party had broken apart (Faragher et al. 1997: 455; McPherson 1988: 135-44; Fehrenbacher 1989: 363). However, it served a useful purpose for the rabbi's point. Leucht used Haman as a critique of American Protestant discrimination against and hatred toward a multitude of non-Protestants, including Jews. He furthered the critique by associating these Protestant ideas with Haman, the antagonist of the book of Esther who paid the ultimate price for standing against God's chosen people. Even though the Persians managed to quash public expression of Jewish identity and to perpetrate persecution against Jews, the story clearly indicated where God's sympathies lay. Haman, not the Jews, was destroyed. The book of Esther, therefore, contained a hidden providence that watched over and aided Jews against the oppressive

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actions of those who held political and social power. Suddenly, those who appeared to be in the position of self—the Persians and the Know-Nothing Protestants—actually assumed the position of the other in the eyes of God. Leucht used the book of Esther to warn those who sought to destroy or denigrate Jews. Remarkably, he had done so in a Protestant publication. Just as Mordecai and Esther requisitioned the court of Ahasuerus to further the Jewish cause, so too had Leucht. Yet he did not cast all Protestants or Christians as protagonists. By making the book of Esther dear to all those who had not been strangled by materialism or atheism (Leucht 1883: 588) and by associating those hostile to Jews with Haman, he transformed the self-other distinction from Christian-Jew to Christian/Jew over against Know-Nothing Christian. In essence, he used the book of Esther to convert Jews from American other to American self. While God's actions on behalf of Jews may not always be evident, he lurked silently and obscurely, even in hiding. Jews and Christians could be assured, however, that at any moment God might emerge to save his people. Rabbi Leucht had entitled his article 'The Mysteries of the Book of Esther'. He focused on two mysteries, the historical nature of the book and the silence of the prophets and of God. While many had argued that these two questions rendered the book of little value, Leucht concluded just the opposite. Rooted in history, the book affirmed God's mysterious providence and taught Jews how to live in the midst of a silent God. What to many Christians may have been the most remote outpost of the Bible became, to some Jews of the nineteenth century, an essential avenue for survival as Jews and Americans. A Fair Type of True Womanhood Kaufmann Kohler (1843-1926) played an exceedingly important role in the development of Reform Judaism in America. A native of Bavaria, he undertook his doctoral studies at Berlin and Erlangen, graduating in 1867. His doctoral dissertation, Der Segen Jacobs, was considered so radical that it kept him from attaining a rabbinic position in Germany. He therefore journeyed to the United States in 1869, and served pulpits in Detroit and Chicago until he became the rabbi of Temple Beth-el in New York City in 1879. In 1903 he accepted the presidency of Hebrew Union College in Cincinnati. According to Michael A. Meyer (1988: 271), 'In the last decades of the nineteenth century and the first of the twentieth, it was especially Kaufmann Kohler who spoke for American Reform Judaism'.

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While at Temple Beth-el, he delivered a Sunday lecture in February 1888 entitled, 'Esther or the Jewish Woman'. Kohler began his lecture by stating 'The story related in the Book of Esther must not be taken literally. It has the character of a fiction.' In contrast to Leucht's completely historical reading, Kohler understood the book to be 'a comedy in disguise, farcical both in style and in the manner it used to be recited'. Among the people mentioned in the book, only Ahasuerus, or Xerxes, could be verified historically. Yet the book's truth did not depend on its historicity. Instead, it presented a number of types of truth. Haman represented the type of anti-Semitism, while Mordecai and Esther represented the typical Jew and Jewess. Esther's prominence in the story reflected the Jewish recognition of 'woman's persuasive and heartconquering powers, of her soul-winning quality' (Kohler 1888: 1). In the same manner as Leucht had reached outside the text of Esther in order to frame his interpretation, Kohler placed the book within the context of a story recounted in 1 Esdras 3-4. Set in the Persian court of Darius, the story recounts a debate over what is the stronger power. After considering the power of wine and the king, it concludes that woman is the mightiest power of all. Kohler discerned a deeper meaning in this story. The absolute monarch represented the powers of force and fear. Wine depicted passion, sensuality and the power to subvert law and order. In the woman Kohler saw persuasion, 'a power of a gentler nature moving and subduing man'. Yet, man could be persuaded either for good or evil. Victory came only when persuasion allied itself with truth. He noted that in the story of Esther, wine and women easily ruled the king. The two women, Vashti and Esther, represented the two influences of their gender. Vashti, on the one hand, symbolized external beauty. Esther, however, 'shows the nobler qualities of woman, the gentle grace, the inner beauty, the sympathetic soul which renders her the redeemer of her race' (Kohler 1888:2). While the interpretations advanced by Leucht and Kohler appear to be quite different on the surface, they do have points of striking similarity. Both espouse a philosophy for living in an environment where one's power or control is minimized, where one's fate appears to be in the hands of others. Leucht approached the topic from the perspective of Jews as a race or people, treating how Jews can survive and live as a minority group. Kohler addressed the situation from the standpoint of gender. Kohler's understanding of women and their role reflected to a great degree that of the majority of Americans. Most believed that men and

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women inhabited clearly defined spheres that manifested themselves in specific roles. For the most part, men inhabited the public sphere and women the private. Writing in the 1960s, Barbara Welter (1966: 149-74) defined these roles through the concept of the cult of true womanhood. True womanhood was defined on the basis of four characteristics—piety, purity, submissiveness and domesticity. As wives and mothers, women could exercise great influence over men. Kohler's characterization of Esther reflects much of Welter's depiction. 'Robust man', leading armies, ruling kingdoms and presiding over courts, needed 'delicate woman' to offset his harsher qualities. With her real power manifesting itself in persuasion, Kohler noted, 'Her nature is too delicate to brave the fierce storms of public life. Woman is the power behind the throne. Unseen, she rules the destinies of men and nations. Her influence is the barometer of civilization'. She was not to lead, but to inspire. In doing so, she civilized man. For Kohler, this did not necessarily mean that she was inferior. She was not 'created as a mere duplicate, a second edition of man'. In fact, women exceeded men 'in nobility of mind, in endurance and self-sacrifice'. Yet, clearly, women were not to rule or to enter the public realm. In this respect, Kohler proclaimed Esther to be 'a fair type of true womanhood' (1888: 2-4). Esther modeled true womanhood through her self-sacrifice and devotion. Kohler believed that woman's nature dictated these traits. These traits in turn caused her to risk her life to save her people, just as any true woman would have done. Kohler asked rhetorically, 'And is not every woman on earth destined by Divine Providence to redeem, to elevate, and improve her race, to win man and ennoble him by the sweet and sympathetic qualities of her soul?' Furthermore, Esther carried out these racesaving activities from the confines of her home, which according to Kohler, was 'the first and the only normal sphere of womanly devotion and self-sacrifice'. From the home, woman held exceedingly great influence over her husband and children. From the domestic realm, a woman could build or destroy a man, as well as the community and society. Through economy, contentment, modesty and simplicity, women could influence men for good. Luxury and vanity, however, would destroy men. Kohler found Esther's simplicity especially admirable, which she demonstrated by coming into the king's presence without lavish display. He believed that 'an organized movement in favor of a plain mode of dressing and living' would influence and improve the moral welfare of nineteenthcentury men. Wielding such influence, women bore the responsibility for

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fashioning men's characters at home and in society. As queen of society, women molded men, and men in turn were 'either elevated or debased by what we follow in blind admiration' (Kohler 1888: 4-6). Kohler closed his lecture on Esther by advocating reform in women's education. He believed that the prevailing view of women's education did nothing more than dress 'the young woman for the marriage market, to have her sold to the highest bidder, building a golden cage around her to make her look upon her life as a mere pleasure ground and play'. Instead, women needed to be taught that their divine calling was 'to render the world around her happy and contented, to cheer, comfort, elevate, and inspire man'. In this respect, 'Self-sacrificing Esther is the true type of womanhood'. Women, therefore, should be educated to determine their own value and worth, rather than depend on men for this. By doing so, women could always assert their own independence, power and dignity (Kohler 1888: 6-7). Kohler had identified in Esther those feminine qualities espoused by most in American society. Rather than denouncing Ahasuerus for his treatment of her, Kohler demonstrated how Esther used her supposedly subordinate position to overcome the aims and orders of others who had easier access to power. Kohler's reading became a commentary on power and how one might gain access to it. Historians since Barbara Welter's influential article have noted how nineteenth-century women took active parts in constructing their social identities. Women did not passively accept the roles assigned to them by men, but actively pursued access to the public sphere. The language used to describe male and female spheres became metaphors describing complex power relations (Kerber 1988: 9-39; Gordon 1997: 63-67). This complexity reveals itself in Kohler's reading. Kohler's Esther did not appear passive, but she also reflected some ambivalence regarding women's position. He does not give any indication that women should inhabit any sphere other than the domestic. At the same time, Kohler advocated women asserting their independence apart from men. In fact, in Kohler's reading, men are the objects of women's activities, rather than the reverse. Men are rather passive, while women are the true shapers of society. Yet, women clearly wield this power from the home and do not aspire to positions in the public realm. The Esther of Kaufmann Kohler, therefore, appears to be a woman in transition. She is not a feminist, nor is she a traditionalist. Kohler's assertion that women held the true power in society while remaining in the domestic sphere may have simply been a rhetorical game

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to 'keep women in their place'. Much of the language used by Kohler, however, also surfaced in the ideas of many of the leading feminists of the day. Elizabeth Cady Stanton, for example, recognized the influence women asserted from the domestic realm. In a speech on marriage and divorce given around 1875, Stanton argued for the equality of women in the public and private domains. She also acknowledged that a mother's influence over a child was a power second only to God. Thus, 'there is no such sacredness and responsibility in any other human relation as in that of the mother' (DuBois 1981: 137). Stanton, however, used this domestic power to argue for public equality; Kohler did not. A month after Kohler's lecture on Esther, Stanton reflected on the status of women half a century earlier. According to her, 'Women had no proper appreciation of themselves as factors in civilization. Believing self-denial a higher virtue than self-development, they ignorantly made ladders of themselves by which fathers, husbands, brothers, and sons reached their highest ambitions' (DuBois 1981: 209-10). Sons were educated, but daughters were not. Kohler believed that women controlled civilization by their power to influence men. He separated the development of civilization from the possession of social power. The ability to control society came from the woman's self-sacrifice. The education of women played a key role in developing this self-sacrificial attitude which manifested itself independently of men. Kohler's Esther, therefore, reflected aspects of the cult of true womanhood, but she also bore qualities of Stanton's true woman. By the 1890s, The Woman's Bible, which Stanton helped author, portrayed Esther as one who ruled as well as reigned. She did not merely hold the title of queen, but she exercised power within the public realm. Vashti was 'the first woman recorded whose self respect and courage enabled her to act contrary to the will of her husband', as well as being 'a sublime representative of self-centered womanhood'. Praising both queens, the commentary concluded, 'Women as queenly, as noble and as self-sacrificing as Esther, as self-respecting and as brave as was Vashti, are hampered in their creative office by the unjust statutes of man' (Stanton and Chandler 1975). Kohler dismissed Vashti as representative of external beauty, an influential trait with men, but one that proved inferior to Esther's inner beauty (Kohler 1888: 2). While The Woman's Bible sought to uphold both self-sacrifice and self-development, Kohler saw self-development (education) as the avenue to self-sacrifice. Whereas women such as Stanton used Esther to encourage women to enter the public sphere, Kohler used her to encourage women to remain at home. He did not, however, see women as

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passive. Even though women did not possess public forms of power, they had the ability to influence public matters. In other words, women's ability to exert power did not depend on their public position in society. While Kohler's Esther represented the virtues of true womanhood, a slightly different Esther was portrayed in a Purim play written by Annie Jonas Moses entitled 'Esther: A Drama in Five Acts'. Initially written and published probably during the 1870s, the play was reprinted in 1887. Little is known about Moses. Born in 1839, she was the daughter of Joseph Jonas of Mobile, Alabama, and the wife of Abraham Moses.2 The 1887 version of the play contained a prologue, which the 1870s version did not. This prologue portrayed Ahasuerus as 'man-like' when he thought Vashti to be 'sweeter' after he had sent her away. The king, seeking to relieve his longing for Vashti, sought another queen. The Ahasuerus of Moses' play is not far from the description of men given by Kohler. He acted based on the influence of women over him. The 1887 prologue raised the issue of power by asserting that God showed his power through Esther, who became the savior of her race. The issue of power was furthered by a scene added to the 1887 play that explained Vashti's dismissal. Set in the queen's banquet hall, a maiden approaches Vashti and expresses the homage and appreciation of the people for Vashti's actions. Vashti responds by attributing her actions to the gracious allowance of the king. He deserved the love, reverence and respect of the people. Vashti explains, 'Be faithful and obedient to him and then you will repay me for to my lord, the king, I owe all allegiance'. When the king summons Vashti to appear at his banquet, she acknowledges the king's power to 'command wifely duty and homage', but humbly requests that he not violate 'the traditions of her people and the forms and manners of her women'. She refuses to appear on the basis that it would violate women's honor. She knows, however, what her fate will be (Moses 1887:9-10). This Vashti contrasts with Kohler's, who sought to use her external beauty to control the king. Moses' Vashti humbly disobeys the king as an issue of honor, but then suffers the consequences. She clearly did not have the public power to sustain her disobedience, nor did she use her domestic power to her advantage. In contrast to Vashti, Esther's place in the domestic sphere becomes the locus through which God's power overcomes the king's public power.

2. This information is taken from the American Jewish Archives, Hebrew Union College, Cincinnati, Ohio.

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Moses demonstrates how the submissive and self-sacrificing Esther becomes the conduit of divine power when she uses her domestic power. When Mordecai first approaches Esther about becoming queen, Esther protests that she is 'a humble maiden' and could not be considered for such a high position. Mordecai responds, 'Nay Esther, in this instance the lowly are considered equal to the noble'. She then objects that her faith presents an obstacle. Mordecai counsels her to conceal 'thy faith and thy descent'. Esther balks at this notion, fearing that should her faith be discovered, 'the abasement would be commensurate with my elevation'. At this point, Mordecai urges Esther to take this risk because of her faith. He recounts the sufferings, degradations and oppression of the Jews. He then says, 'Seek then this power that may be granted thee!' Esther submits, praying that power would be given to her to find grace in God's eyes. She asserts, 'My life will I devote to my people, their welfare shall be my first consideration, their happiness my aim. Their cause shall be mine, and together will we raise the banner of our faith, or I will perish in the attempt' (Moses 1887: 11-13). The play's first act maintains that God's superior power is available to those who do not possess public power. In this case, Esther is in a position of weakness because of her gender and her race/religion. Her access to power, however, does not depend on her leaving the domestic sphere. In fact, it depends on her remaining in it and sacrificing herself. This theme of domestic self-sacrifice plays out throughout the drama's remaining four acts. When Mordecai finally tells Esther that she must reveal her status as a Jew in order to save her people, Esther prays. Remembering what had happened to Vashti, she beseeches God for protection from the power of the king. She intends to appear before Ahasuerus and 'plead with woman's tongue for Israel's release' (Moses 1887: 19). Through 'woman's tongue', the Jews are saved. In the closing scenes of the play, Esther proclaims that she 'is but an humble representative of the virtues of her people'. She identifies these virtues as faith, hope and charity, expressed in nursing of the sick, relieving the widow and orphan and comforting the mourner (Moses 1887: 26-27). Moses' Esther is similar to that of Kohler's. Both uphold the womanly virtue of self-sacrifice within the domestic realm. They also assert the woman's ability to influence men and their work in the public sphere. Moses, however, furthers the depiction of Esther by making explicit her role in the manifestation of God's power. Throughout the play, allusions are made to the Exodus. Esther's reluctant willingness to make herself

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available as a candidate for queen is reminiscent of Moses' reticence to return to Egypt on behalf of the Hebrews. Mordecai's description of the Jews in Persia as degraded and oppressed and crying out for mercy parallels the situation of the Hebrews in Egypt. Hainan's wife, Zeresh, makes explicit the associations with the Exodus by referring to the oftrepeated 'tale' of divine deliverance from Egyptian bondage. Esther, then, is portrayed as a Moses-like character. Kohler does not make such a grand depiction of Esther. His Esther is the ultimate Jewish American woman, while Moses' is the ultimate Jew. These Mosaic associations help to demonstrate the superiority of domestic power over public power. God chooses to thwart the influence of the public through self-sacrificing woman. The domestic Esther does not merely influence or guide society, but overturns relations based on social power. The interpretations of the book of Esther given by Isaac L. Leucht, Kaufmann Kohler and Annie Jonas Moses unveil the power of the text. Reading Esther backwards by beginning with these nineteenth-century renderings casts light on the bedrock of the text. These three readings indicate that Esther is a book supremely concerned with power, its possession and its confrontation. Discussions of power ultimately raise issues of boundaries and identity. Their interpretations also demonstrate the power of the book of Esther to embolden and free (or perhaps even enslave), whether one be a Jewish American living among Christians, a woman living in a male-dominated society, or, in my case, a Southern Baptist living in a denomination that has changed dramatically during the last two decades.

FROM MAIDENS AND CHAMBERLAINS TO HAREMS AND HOT TUBS:

FIVE HUNDRED YEARS OF ESTHER IN ENGLISH

Leonard J. Greenspoon

Introduction Among the Dead Sea Scrolls, numerous manuscripts of the Psalms indicate the apparent popularity of this collection among the residents of Qumran. By contrast, the lack of any copies of the book of Esther seems to signal a singular lack of interest in or knowledge of this material (VanderKam 1994: 30-32). Even a cursory examination of English Bible translations confirms the continued elevated status of the Psalter in this tradition. Its wide usage in liturgy and in private devotion adds to the frequency of its renderings. On the other hand, among English speakers the book of Esther has garnered far more interest, as transmitted and as translated text, than at Qumran. This is largely due to its pivotal role as the Megillah on the holiday of Purim. Its lively literary style has also attracted substantial comment. In this article I will examine 32 English translations of the book of Esther. Eight of them are Jewish translations, 18 Christian (Protestant or Catholic) and six represent what I call 'freestanding' renderings. Whereas the first 26 are part of a unified effort covering the entire Bible (Jewish, Protestant or Catholic), these latter six were especially prepared editions of Esther by individuals who also supplied commentary. The earliest translation dates from 1611; the latest was published in 1997. Although the period thus covered—almost 400 years—would seem to call into question the longer chronology envisioned in my title, this is not necessarily so, since the King James Version of 1611 incorporated a number of characteristic renderings from the century prior to its appearance (see, most recently, Bobrick 2001 and McGrath 2001). To the best of my knowledge, all 32 of these translations are accessible in one or more editions or reprints. The list that follows gives some basic

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information concerning each. In the presentation of readings at the heart of this paper, these versions will be referred to in abbreviated fashion: Jewish Translations Isaac Leeser (trans.), The Twenty-Four Books of the Holy Leeser Bible: Hebrew and English (1853-54) M. Friedlander (trans.), Jewish Family Bible (1881) JFB JB/Koren Jerusalem Bible/Koren—The Holy Scriptures (1997 [published by Koren Publishers, the English text is that of JFB (above), which was revised and edited by Harold Fisch]) Alexander Harkavy (trans.), The Holy Scriptures, Revised Harkavy in Accordance with Jewish Tradition and Modern Biblical Scholarship (1916) The Holy Scriptures According to the Masoretic Text, JPS brought out by the Jewish Publication Society of America (1917) New Jewish Version—Tanakh: A New Translation of the NJV Holy Scriptures According to the Traditional Hebrew Text, brought out by the Jewish Publication Society of America (1985) Tanach: The Stone Edition/The ArtScroll Series (1996) Tanach Living Nach The Living Nach: Sacred Writings (part of the Living Torah Series) (1998) Christian Translations King James Version (1611) New King James Version (1979) NKJV NASB New American Standard Bible (1971) Revised Standard Version (1952) RSV NRSV New Revised Standard Version (1989) NIV New International Version (1973) NAB New American Bible (1970) New Jerusalem Bible (1985) NJB NEB New English Bible (1970) REB Revised English Bible (1989) Moffatt James Moffatt (trans.), The Bible: A New Translation (1926) AT J.M. Powis Smith et al. (trans.), The Complete Bible: An American Translation (1927) AmpB Amplified Bible (1965) LB Living Bible (1971) NLT New Living Translation (1996) GNB Good News Bible (1976) CEV Contemporary English Version (1995) NCV New Century Version (1991) KJV

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'Freestandinp' Translations Moore Carey A. Moore, Esther: A New Translation with Introduction and Notes (1971) Gordis Robert Gordis, Megillat Esther: The Masoretic Hebrew Text with Introduction, New Translation and Commentary (1974) Greenstein Edward L. Greenstein, 'The Scroll of Esther: A New Translation' (1990) Fox Michael V. Fox, Character and Ideology in the Book of Esther (1991) Bush Frederic W. Bush, Ruth/Esther (1996) Levenson Jon D. Levenson, Esther: A Commentary (1997)

The structure of this listing is admittedly somewhat idiosyncratic, although each 'category' of versions follows a roughly chronological order. The first category comprises eight Jewish translations from the mid-nineteenth to the late twentieth century (on English translations by/for Jews, see Greenspoon 1988; forthcoming; Hertz 1938; Grim 1982; Kubo and Specht 1983: 117-43; Orlinsky and Bratcher 1991; Sarna 1989; Sarna and Sarna 1988; Singerman 1990). There follow the influential KJV of 1611 and four of its twentieth century revisions (or revisions of its revisions). As a widely read conservative Protestant text, the Niv is appended, as it were, to this grouping, although formally it is a fresh translation rather than a revision. There are two Catholic translations of the Old Testament into English, and they, the NAB and the NJB, come next, followed by the consciously literary British texts, the NEB and its revision, the REB. With the exception of NJB, all of the translations thus far enumerated may be termed 'formal equivalences'. The next eight exemplify, to varying degrees, the principles of functional equivalence (De Waard andNida 1986), spilling over, in the case of LB, to paraphrase. LB and NLT, although quite different as finished products, are closely linked in their origins; hence they are placed next to each other. This is also the case for GNB and CEV, both prepared under the sponsorship of the American Bible Society (for overviews of Bible translations into English, see Bailey 1982; Gilmore 2000; Kerr 1999; Kubo and Specht 1983; Lewis 1981 [with no discussion of Jewish versions]; Sheeley and Nash 1997; also Herbert 1968; Hills 1962). The six freestanding renderings appear in chronological order, although they represent varied approaches to this genre. Moore, Bush and Levenson wrote for important commentary series, in which, I think it is fair to say, the rendering of the biblical text is decidedly less important than its annotation. To a large degree, this is also true for Gordis and Fox, although for them it becomes increasingly important to reflect nuances of Hebrew

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meaning in the English version. For Greenstein, this literary/ideological goal is primary, and even his commentary centers on issues of method and meaning. For the remainder of this article, my task is largely descriptive rather than evaluative. That is to say, I am interested in describing certain characteristics of these versions, with a view to understanding what 'biblical text' they render, how they render that text, the effect that text was/is likely to have on its intended audience and the influence, whether fleeting or lasting, of a given version on subsequent translations. Where possible, it is also worthwhile to focus attention on the translators themselves, to define the historical, cultural, social, political and religious contexts in which they operated, and to determine their mutual interactions (as, for example, in Greenspoon 1988 and 1998). All of this falls under the rubric of description, a helpful process through which we can come to appreciate each translation on its own terms and in its own right. Translation, never an easy endeavor, is all the more difficult when we move from one language group, Semitic, to another, Indo-European, and between societies and civilizations separated by at least two millennia. Each of these versions represents a degree of success in this arduous task, admittedly more in some cases than in others. Although in a given version it is neither possible nor desirable to overlook weaknesses or flaws, however defined, that is not my primary purpose and I devote little energy to it. What is Being Translated? Even careful readers of English Bibles are likely to evaluate a given version on the basis of how it translates rather than what it is rendering. Although these are related issues, they are also separable. It is to the question of base text that I first turn. In order to provide the maximum number of comparisons, I restrict this analysis to the portions of Esther for which we have an ancient Hebrew text. The longer version of Esther is indeed found in many modern English Bibles—not only in the Catholic NAB and NJB, for which it is canonical, but also in so-called 'ecumenical' editions of, for example, the RSV and NRSV. Nevertheless, by limiting the scope of this study, we have access to the material shared by Jews and all Christians. The traditional Hebrew is generally (if somewhat inaccurately) referred to as the Masoretic Text (MT). Although it is not found in its full, vocal-

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ized form prior to the tenth century, the ancient Greek translation known as the Septuagint (LXX) and the Dead Sea Scrolls amply demonstrate the antiquity of this Hebrew wording (Tov 2001). For the most part, Jewish and conservative Christian translators work exclusively with the MT, on occasion preferring to render even incomprehensible Hebrew rather than resort to the evidence of other ancient witnesses (the history of Bible translating among Jews is dealt with in Greenspoon 1993; 2002a; Margolis 1917; Orlinsky 1974; 1992). Other translators or translation teams are willing to part company with the MT when, in their judgment, another attested ancient reading makes better sense in a given context. There are, additionally, translators who try to assess all of the ancient evidence, with no a priori preference for one over the others; they (and others) may also admit into their text conjectural emendations for which there are no extant witnesses (Orlinsky and Bratcher 1991). Translation committees and individual translators tend to adopt—or at least try to—consistent principles throughout the Hebrew Bible when it comes to determining the text they translate. Still, it sometimes happens that translators may veer from a mostly conservative approach when the MT of a particular book does not seem to be in a good state of preservation. For Esther, by contrast, there is general agreement that the MT is in good, some might even argue perfect, condition. For this reason, we find relatively little variation from the MT even in modern versions that are more 'adventuresome' elsewhere in the Hebrew Bible. So, for example, the NEB and its successor, REB, exhibit just over half a dozen departures from the MT, about the same number as the NJB and the NRSV. Among the freestanding translators, Fox and Bush deviate from the MT three times, Levenson a few more and Moore over 30. Numbers themselves do not, of course, tell the whole story. For example, the inclusion of even one non-MT reading by Bush in the conservative Word Biblical Commentary series is noteworthy, undoubtedly the result of considerable soul-searching as well as philological investigation on his part (Bush 1996: 278, 469-71). The most widely attested non-MT readings are at 3.7, 9.29 (with two closely related instances) and 9.31. It is well worth noting that in these instances the non-MT text is largely conjectural; that is, it lacks attestation in any ancient witness. As noted above, translators tend to be reluctant to accept such emendations. In 3.7, at Haman's instigation, 'lots' (D'HIS) are cast to determine the day on which the Jews of Persia, with royal acquiescence, are to be slain. As rendered in the RSV, and in accordance with the MT, the text reads:

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The Book of Esther in Modern Research In the first month, which is the month of Nisan, in the twelfth year of King Ahasuerus, they cast Pur, that is the lot, before Haman day after day; and they cast it month after month till the twelfth month, which is the month of Adar.

Readers might well expect the specification of a day of the month parallel to the specification of the month itself. In the MT, and in versions following it, the specific date, the thirteenth (of Adar), is not provided until later in the chapter. A number of English translations, such as the NRSV, add 'the thirteenth day' in v. 7 ad sensum and as the result of their judgment that this phrase may have accidentally dropped out from the Hebrew text in the course of its transmission. In the listing that follows, texts with 'the thirteenth day' are designated 'non-MT'. The last section of Esther 9 in the MT is somewhat difficult to interpret in its entirety; so, a note in the NJV observes: 'Force of vv. 29-31 uncertain in part'. Two points of uncertainty occur in v. 29, which appears in the RSV, reflecting the MT, as: Then Queen Esther, the daughter of Abihail, and Mordecai the Jew gave full written authority, confirming this second letter about Purim.

The verb translated 'gave full written authority' is in the singular in the Hebrew, suggesting to some interpreters (and translators) that 'Mordecai the Jew' is an added feature. Questions are also raised about the word 'second', since it is not clear what earlier 'letter about Purim' would have been intended. Furthermore, in v. 31, there is some reason to doubt the originality of 'Queen Esther' in the phrase (so RSV), 'as Mordecai the Jew and Queen Esther enjoined upon the Jews'. The elimination of 'Queen Esther' here, as with 'Mordecai the Jew' and 'second' two verses earlier, does produce a smoother (though not necessarily original) text, although it lacks ancient support. English versions without this wording are marked 'non-MT' at the appropriate places. Where appropriate, distinctive features are signaled: Leeser 3.7: 9.29: 9.31:

MT MT; MT (with 'confirm this letter.. .the second time') MT

JFB

3.7: 9.29: 9.31:

MT MT; MT MT

GREENSPOON From Maidens and Chamberlains JB/Koren 3.7: MT 9.29: MT (with 'Mordekhay'); MT 9.31: MT Harkavy 3.7: MT 9.29: MT; MT 9.31: MT JPS

3.7: 9.29: 9.31:

MT

MT; MT MT

NJV

3.7: 9.29: 9.31: Tanach 3.7: 9.29: 9.31:

MT

MT; MT MT (with ' — and now Queen Esther— ') MT

MT (with 'along with Mordechai the Jew'); MT MT

Living Nach 3.7: MT 9.29: MT (with 'Avichayil' and 'Mordechai'); MT 9.31: MT KJV

3.7: 9.29: 9.31:

MT MT; MT MT

NKJV

3.7: 9.29: 9.31:

MT

MT(with 'with...'); MT MT

NASB

3.7: 9.29: 9.31:

MT

MT(with 'with...'); MT MT

RSV

3.7: 9.29: 9.31:

MT MT; MT MT

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224 NRSV

3.7: 9.29: 9.31:

non-MT MT (with 'along with the Jew Mordecai'); MT MT

NIV

3.7: 9.29: 9.31:

MT

MT (with 'along with. . . '); MT MT

NAB

3.7: 9.29:

non-MT (with 'Queen Esther, daughter of ... and of Mordecai the Jew', which results in Mordecai's identification as Esther's father); MT

9.31:

MT

NJB

3.7: 9.29: 9.31:

MT

non-MT; MT non-MT

NEB

3.7: 9.29:

non-MT MT (with 'Queen Esther... gave full authority in writing to Mordecai'); MT

9.31:

non-MT

REB

3.7: 9.29:

non-MT MT (with 'Queen Esther... gave full authority in writing to Mordecai'); MT

9.31: Moffatt 3.7: 9.29: 9.31:

MT

non-MT non-MT; MT (with 'the following second message') non-MT

AT

3.7: 9.29: 9.31: AmpB 3.7: 9.29: 9.31:

MT MT; MT MT

MT

MT (with 'with Mordecai the Jew'); MT MT

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LB

3.7: 9.29:

MT

9.31:

MT

MT (with 'Meanwhile, Queen Esther [daughter of Abihail and later adopted by Mordecai the Jew]'); MT(?) (with 'Esther... had written a letter throwing her full support behind Mordecai's letter inaugurating his annual Feast of Purim')

NLT

3.7: 9.29:

non-MT [with 'March 7'!] MT (with 'along with Mordecai the Jew'); MT (with 'wrote another letter putting the queen's full authority behind Mordecai's letter to establish the Festival of Purim')

9.31:

MT

GNB

3.7: 9.29:

non-MT MT (with 'along with Mordecai'); MT (with ' . . .also wrote a letter, putting her full authority behind the letter about Purim, which Mordecai had written earlier')

9.31:

MT

CEV

3.7: 9.29:

9.31:

MT

MT; MT (?) (with 'Queen Esther... wanted to give full authority to Mordecai's letter about the Festival of Purim and with his help she wrote a letter about the feast') ?

NCV

3.7: 9.29: 9.31: Moore 3.7: 9.29: 9.31: Gordis 3.7: 9.29: 9.31:

MT

MT (with 'along with Mordecai the Jew'); MT MT

non-MT MT (with 'along with Mordecai the Jew'); MT non-MT MT

MT; MT MT

Greenstein 3.7: MT 9.29: MT (with 'Mordekhai the Jew'); MT 9.31: MT (with 'Esther the king's-wife')

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Fox 3.7: 9.29: 9.31:

non-MT non-Mi; non-MT non-MT

Bush 3.7: 9.29: 9.31:

non-MT non-MT; non-MT non-MT

Levenson 3.7: non-MT 9.29: MT; MT 9.31: MT

A few observations are in order here: (1) all versions produced under the auspices of Jewish organizations follow the MT here and elsewhere; (2) it was not until the 1920s, with Moffatt, that variations from the MT appear in the translation itself, and not until the post-World War II period that they become at all numerous; (3) recent versions that adopt a more contemporary mode, such as LB, GNB and CEV, often labor to express what more traditional translations render quite succinctly; (4) the few 'oddities', especially at 9.29, do reflect a lack of certainty about exactly how to translate this verse, an uncertainty that other translators handle, for example, with the phrase '...[along] with' or some such wording. How to Translate: Naming Names Most readers or potential purchasers of a Bible translation are justifiably first attracted (or repelled) by looking at one or more specific passages, often favorite or familiar ones (for Jewish audiences, see Greenspoon 2002b). In defining the multitude of differences in how translators convey the ancient Semitic text into 'suitable' English, it often comes down to 'literal' vs. 'free'. In fact, there are many stages or steps along what I would call the continuum from interlinear Hebrew-English at one end to paraphrase at the other (for significant theoretical discussions of these and related issues, see Buber and Rosenzweig 1994; De Waard andNida 1986; Greenstein 1989). And there are many ingredients, as it were, in this mixture. I will look at several of them in the examples that follow. We begin, appropriately enough, at the beginning. In the first example from 9.29,1 occasionally noted variations in the transliteration of the Jewish hero's name, usually written 'Mordecai'. Here I focus on the name of the Persian king, typically represented as 'Ahasuerus' (Est. 1.1), although

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other forms that adhere more closely to the Hebrew can be observed. Whether or not we think that there is a historical basis for the book of Esther, King Ahasuerus is easily identifiable with a known Persian monarch whom we call, after Herodotus, Xerxes. Translations that use this name instead of one or another form of the Semitic are engaging in the process of substituting a more familiar name or term for the less well known. This is evident also in some renderings of Est. 1.2, where the better-known Greek name, 'Susa', appears in place of the Semitic form, 'Shushan'. In the MT, 'Shushan' appears before the word variously translated as 'capital', 'fortress', and so on (Omanson and Noss 1997: 15). Retaining this order, against the more usual (in English) 'capital/fortress of Shushan/ Susa', also serves to maintain a sense of closeness to the original Hebrew and a touch of the exotic, from the perspective of contemporary readers. Given the fact that Esther 1 is filled with exotic extravagances, I do not hesitate to put forward the opinion that readers are well served here by translations preserving the distinctive features of the Semitic word and world: Leeser Achashverosh Shushan the capital JFB

Ahasuerus Shushan the palace JB/Koren Ah-ashverosh Shushan the capital Harkavy Ahasuerus Shushan the palace JPS

Ahasuerus Shushan the castle NJV

Ahasuerus the fortress Shushan Tanach Ahasuerus Shushan the capital

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Living Nach Ahasuerus the capital Shushan KJV

Ahasuerus Shushan the palace NKJV

Ahasuerus Shushan the citadel NASB

Ahasuerus Susa the capital RSV

Ahasuerus Susa the capital NRSV

Ahasuerus the citadel of Susa NIV

Xerxes the citadel of Susa NAB

Ahasuerus the city of Susa NJB

Ahasuerus the citadel of Susa NEB

Ahasuerus Susa the capital city REB

Ahasuerus Susa, the capital city Moffatt Xerxes the citadel of Susa AT

Xerxes the castle at Shushan

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AmpB Ahasuerus [Xerxes] Shushan or Susa [the capital of the Persian Empire] in the palace or castle LB

Ahasuerus Shushan Palace NLT

Xerxes the fortress of Susa GNB

Xerxes Persia's capital city of Susa CEV

Xerxes his capital city of Susa NCV

Xerxes his capital city of Susa Moore Xerxes in the acropolis of Susa Gordis Ahasuerus Shushan the capital Greenstein Ahashveirosh Shushan the fortress

Fox Xerxes the Fortress of Susa Bush Ahasuerus the citadel of Susa Levenson Ahasuerus the fortified compound of Susa

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As was the case with the introduction of non-MT readings, the substitutions of 'Xerxes' and 'Susa' are relatively recent innovations, dating from the 1920s. With the exception of traditional versions, which regularly incorporate features that bring the English close to the Hebrew, there is little consistency in which of the three 'changes' a given version exhibits. On the whole, translators appear to have been a bit more open to 'Susa' than to 'Xerxes', recognizing perhaps the familiar sound of the name Ahasuerus—especially among Jewish audiences. How to Translate: A 'heart.. .merry with wine' Hebrew, in common with many other languages, has a number of colorful expressions and distinctive ways of describing circumstances and attitudes. In particular, the Hebrew of the Old Testament delights in concrete descriptions, some of which involve parts of the body. A literal English rendering of such phrases is typically comprehensible, but far from current in its wording. A good example of this from the book of Esther is 1.10, where the traditional reading ('the heart of the king was merry with wine') closely reflects the Hebrew text. However, many translators, even those generally thought of as conservative, have felt the urge to 'improve' on this in one way or another, as the following list shows: Leaser the heart of the king was merry with wine JFB

the heart of the king was merry with wine JB/Koren the heart of the king was merry with wine Harkavy the heart of the king was merry with wine

JPS the heart of the king was merry with wine NJV

the king was merry with wine Tanach the heart of the king was merry with wine Living Nach the king's heart was merry with wine

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KJV

the heart of the king was merry with wine NKJV

the heart of the king was merry with wine NASB

the heart of the king was merry with wine RSV

the heart of the king was merry with wine NRSV

the king was merry with wine NIV

King Xerxes was in high spirits from wine NAB

the king was merry with wine NJB

the king was merry with wine NEB

he was merry with wine REB

he was merry with wine Moffatt the king's heart was merry with wine AT

the king's heart was joyous with wine AmpB the king's heart was merry with wine LB

the king was feeling high, half drunk from wine NLT

King Xerxes was half drunk with wine GNB

the king was drinking and feeling happy CEV

King Xerxes was feeling happy because of so much wine NCV

King Xerxes was very happy, because he had been drinking much wine

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Moore the king was feeling high from the wine Gordis the king was far gone in his cups Greenstein the king's heart was good from wine Fox

the king was lightheaded with wine Bush the king was lightheaded with wine Levenson the king was merry with wine

The simplest change, found in NJV, NRSV, NAB, NJB and Levenson, is to eliminate the reference to the 'heart', which is essentially unnecessary in English. Fox and Bush perform the anatomical transfer from heart to head, to arrive at a more easily recognizable English idiom. Gordis's 'in his cups' seems a bit dated, but perfectly appropriate and perhaps literally applicable to a monarch who had been drinking so heavily. But how heavily was he drinking? He was almost certainly 'high', to use a current expression, and may well have been more than the 'half drunk' of LB and NLT. Whether of not he felt 'merry' at that particular moment, his mood and the mood of the story were soon to change in the course of events subsequently narrated in the book of Esther. How to Translate: 'Wrath', 'Wrath'and more 'Wrath' Of the translators and commentators featured in this article, none has been more forceful or effective than Edward Greenstein in pointing out nuances in the Hebrew that are frequently overlooked in English versions. Wordplays are notoriously difficult to 'translate' from one culture to another, to say nothing of from one language to another. Nonetheless, as Greenstein cogently argues, there are substantial payoffs for an English-speaking audience when such efforts are made—and this is especially the case for the book of Esther. As already noted, albeit in passing, the book of Esther is universally recognized as a literary success, much of it owing to a plot self-referentially rich in parallels and reversals. Both of these features are largely

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carried by repeated 'leading-words', which functioned (and continue to function) as cues for Hebrew readers that a connection is being made between non-contiguous verses of the same chapter or across chapters of the same book. (Inter-book connections, frequent enough, are not directly relevant to the present discussion.) Greenstein makes it one of the distinctive features of his version to render 'leading-words' in such a manner that English readers may have the same experience as those with direct access to the Hebrew original. One of his examples involves 7.10 and 2.1: The story of [the] miraculous turn of events, as narrated in chapters 8 and 9, in general recapitulates phrases and characterizations of the first three chapters. Few modern English translations will lend themselves to discovering them, because they will render the parallel language of the original Hebrew in divergent English expressions. For example, 'and the wrath of the king abated' in 7.10 recalls to the Hebrew reader/hearer 2.1: 'as the wrath of the King Ahashveirosh abated'... The echo in the original, preserved in my 'concordant' type of translation, is charged with more significance than style alone. The repetition serves to juxtapose parallel circumstances. In each instance, an ethnic Persian had disappointed the king—first his wife, Vashti, then his viceroy Haman. When the king overcame his exaggerated rage—as related in the parallel verses—he elevated Jewish counterparts who pleased him, Esther and Mordekhai. This dynamic is not marginal but cuts straight to the core meaning of the story: Jews are not bad but good for Persia. (Greenstein 1990: 55)

To be fair, this particular emphasis is not a priority for all translators into English, especially for those who shun repetition as if to equate it with a dearth of lexical knowledge or stylistic dexterity. Moreover, almost all English versions are quite consistent in their rendering of the Hebrew term for 'banquet' or 'feast', which carries a major motif throughout the book. Nonetheless, it is useful to compare and contrast the variety of renderings at 2.1 and 7.10, which share identical nouns and verbs, with Greenstein's observations in mind. In order to expand the basis for comparison, I also include readings at 1.12, which records the king's reaction to Vashti's refusal to appear. The last noun of this verse in Hebrew is identical to the word found at MT 2.1 and 7.10; in all three instances it is translated as 'wrath' by Greenstein. Such consistent rendering aids readers in making the connections that Esther's author surely intended:

The Book of Esther in Modern Research

234 Leeser 1.12: 2.1: 7.10:

and the king was very wroth, and his fury burnt in him when the fury of king Achashverosh was appeased and the fury of the king was appeased

JFB

1.12: 2.1: 7.10:

therefore was the king very wroth, and his anger burned in him when the wrath of king Ahasuerus was appeased then was the king's wrath pacified

JB/Koren 1.12: therefore the king was very wrathful, and his anger burned in him 2.1: when the wrath of king Ah-ashverosh was appeased 7.10: then the king's wrath was pacified Harkavy 1.12: wherefore the king was very wroth, and his anger burned in him 2.1: when the wrath of king Ahasuerus was appeased 7.10: then was the king's wrath pacified JPS

1.12: 2.1: 7.10:

therefore was the king very wroth, and his anger burned in him when the wrath of king Ahasuerus was assuaged then was the king's wrath assuaged

NJV

1.12: 2.1: 7.10: Tanach 1.12: 2.1: 7.10:

the king was greatly incensed, and his fury burned within him when the anger of King Ahasuerus subsided and the king's fury abated the king therefore became very enraged and his wrath burned in him when the wrath of King Ahasuerus subsided and the king's anger abated

Living Nach 1.12: the king grew furious, and his anger seethed within him 2.1: when King Ahasuerus 's anger abated 7.10: and the king's anger abated KJV

1.12: 2.1: 7.10:

therefore was the king very wroth, and his anger burned in him when the wrath of king Ahasuerus was appeased then was the king's wrath pacified

NKJV

1.12: 2.1: 7.10:

therefore the king was furious, and his anger burned within him when the wrath of King Ahasuerus subsided then the king's wrath subsided

GREENSPOON From Maidens and Chamberlains

235

NASB

1.12: 2.1: 7.10:

then the king became very angry and his wrath burned within him when the anger of King Ahasuerus had subsided and the king's anger subsided

RSV

1.12: 2.1: 7.10:

at this the king was enraged, and his anger burned within him when the anger of King Ahasuerus had abated then the anger of the king abated

NRSV

1.12: 2.1: 7.10:

at this the king was enraged, and his anger burned within him when the anger of King Ahasuerus had abated then the anger of the king abated

NIV

1.12: 2.1: 7.10:

then the king became furious and burned with anger when the anger of King Xerxes had subsided then the king's fury subsided

NAB

1.12: 2.1: 7.10:

At this the king's wrath flared up, and he burned with fury when King Ahasuerus 's wrath had cooled and the anger of the king abated

NJB

1.12: 2.1: 7.10:

the king was very angry at this, and his wrath grew hot when the king's wrath had subsided and the king's wrath subsided

NEB

1.12: 2.1: 7.10:

this greatly incensed the king, and he grew hot with anger when the anger of King Ahasuerus had died down after that the king's rage abated

REB

1.12: 2.1: 7.10: Moffatt 1.12: 2.1: 7.10:

this greatly incensed the king, and his wrath flared up when the rage of King Ahasuerus had died down then the king's anger subsided then the king was furious, and his anger blazed up the anger of king Xerxes calmed down and the king's anger calmed down

AT

1.12: 2.1: 7.10:

therefore the king was greatly enraged, and his anger burned within him when the wrath of King Xerxes was pacified then the king's wrath abated

The Book of Esther in Modern Research

236 AmpB 1.12: 2.1: 7.10:

therefore the king was enraged, and his anger burned within him when the wrath of King Ahasuerus was pacified then the king's wrath was pacified

LB

1.12: 2.1: 7.10:

the king was furious after King Ahasuerus 's anger had cooled and the king's wrath was pacified

NLT

1.12: 2.1: 7.10:

this made the king furious, and he burned with anger after Xerxes 's anger had cooled and the king's anger was pacified

GNB

1.12: 2.1: 7.10:

this made the king furious even after the king's anger had cooled down then the king's anger cooled down

CEV

1.12: 2.1: 7.10:

and this made him terribly angry King Xerxes got over being angry and the king calmed down

NCV

1.12: 2.1: 7.10:

then the king became very angry; his anger was like a burning fire when King Xerxes was not so angry then the king was not so angry anymore

Moore 1.12: 2.1: 7.10:

the king became very angry at this, and he was quite incensed when King Xerxes' anger had subsided then the king's anger abated

Gordis 1.12: 2.1: 7.10:

the king became enraged, and his anger burned within him when King Ahasuerus 's anger had abated only then the king's anger abated

Greenstein 1.12: he fumed very much, the king did, and the wrath burned inside him 2.1: as the wrath of the king Ahashveirosh abated 7.10: and the wrath of the king abated

Fox 1.12: 2.1: 7.10:

and the king became very angry and his wrath burned hot within him when King Xerxes' wrath had subsided and the king's wrath subsided

GREENSPOON From Maidens and Chamberlains Bush 1.12: 2.1: 7.10:

237

at this the king became very angry, and his rage burned within him when the anger of King Ahasuerus had subsided and the anger of the king subsided

Levenson 1.12: the king became highly incensed, and his rage burned within him 2.1: when King Ahasuerus's rage had abated 7.10: and the king' s rage abated

How to Translate: 'From Maiden to Hot Tubs' My final set of examples comes from the first part of this chapter's title: 'From Maidens and Chamberlains to Harems and Hot Tubs'. For the sake of full disclosure, I hasten to admit that hot tubs do not appear in any translation of Esther with which I am familiar, although I have seen a reference or two to a beauty parlor (e.g. De Troyer 1995). In any case, we do have interesting variations in the traditional English renderings of three Hebrew terms: 'chamberlain' (or 'chamberlains', in the plural), 'house of the women' and 'maidens' (for the variation in the name 'Hege' or 'Hegai' at 2.3, see Moore 1971: 15; Bush 1996: 358): Leeser 1.10: 2.3: 2.4:

the seven chamberlains that served in the presence of king Achashverosh house of the women.. .Hege the king's chamberlain [see also 2.9, 12] maiden

1.10: 2.3: 2.4:

the seven chamberlains that served in the presence of Ahasuerus the king house of the women.. .Hege the king's chamberlain maiden

JFB

JB/Koren 1.10: the seven chamberlains who served in the presence of Ah-ashverosh the king 2.3: house of the women... Hege the king' s chamberlain 2.4: girl Harkavy 1.10: the seven chamberlains that serve in the presence of Ahasuerus the king 2.3: house of the women... Hege the king' s chamberlain 2.4: maiden

The Book of Esther in Modern Research

238 JPS 1.10: 2.3: 2.4:

the seven chamberlains that ministered in the presence of Ahasuerus the king house of the women. . .Hegai the king's chamberlain maiden

NJV 1.10: 2.3: 2.4:

the seven eunuchs in attendance on King Ahasuerus harem. . .Hege, the king's eunuch maiden

Tanach 1.10: 2.3: 2.4:

the seven chamberlains who attended King Ahasuerus harem . . . Hegai the king ' s chamberlain girl

Living Nach 1.10: the seven chamberlains who attended King Ahasuerus 2.3: harem ... the King ' s eunuch Hegai 2.4: girl KJV 1.10: 2.3: 2.4:

the seven chamberlains that served in the presence of Ahasuerus the king house of the women. . .Hege the king's chamberlain maiden

NKJV

1.10: 2.3: 2.4:

seven eunuchs who served in the presence of King Ahasuerus women's quarters...Hegai the king's eunuch young woman

NASB

1.10: 2.3: 2.4:

the seven eunuchs who served in the presence of King Ahasuerus harem...Hegai, the king's eunuch young lady

RSV

1.10: 2.3: 2.4: NRSV 1.10: 2.3: 2.4:

the seven eunuchs who served King Ahasuerus as chamberlains harem.. .Hegai the king's eunuch maiden the seven eunuchs who attended him harem.. .Hegai, the king's eunuch girl

NIV

1.10: 2.3: 2.4:

the seven eunuchs who served him harem...Hegai, the king's eunuch girl

GREENSPOON From Maidens and Chamberlains

239

NAB

1.10: the seven eunuchs who attended King Ahasuerus 2.3: harem... the royal eunuch Hegai 2.4: girl NJB

1.10: 2.3: 2.4:

the seven eunuchs in attendance on the person of King Ahasuerus harem.. .Hegai the king's eunuch girl

NEB

1.10: 2.3: 2.4:

the seven eunuchs who were in attendance on the king's person women' s quarters... Hegai, the king' s eunuch the one

REB

1.10: 2.3: 2.4:

the seven eunuchs who were in attendance on the king's person women's quarters...Hegai, the king's eunuch girl

Moffatt 1.10: the seven eunuchs who served in the retinue of King Xerxes 2.3: harem.. .Hege, the king's eunuch 2.4: girl AT

1.10: 2.3: 2.4: AmpB 1.10: 2.3: 2.4:

the seven eunuchs who ministered in the presence of Xerxes the king harem.. .Hegai, the king's eunuch maiden the seven eunuchs who ministered to King Ahasuerus as attendants harem...Hegai, the king's eunuch maiden

LB

1.10: the seven eunuchs who were his personal aides 2.3: royal harem.. .Hegai, the eunuch in charge 2.4: girl NLT

1.10: 2.3: 2.4:

the seven eunuchs who attended him royal harem.. .Hegai, the eunuch in charge young woman

GNB

1.10: 2.3: 2.4:

the seven eunuchs who were his personal servants harem.. .Hegai, the eunuch who is in charge girl

240

The Book of Esther in Modern Research

CEV

1.10: 2.3: 2.4:

his seven personal servants the place where you keep your wives.. .your servant Hegai young woman

NCV

1.10: 2.3: 2.4: Moore 1.10: 2.3: 2.4:

the seven eunuchs who served him women' s quarters... Hegai, the king' s eunuch girl the seven eunuchs who personally served King Xerxes harem... Hegai, the king' s eunuch girl

Gordis 1.10: the seven eunuchs who served as the chamberlains of King Ahasuerus 2.3: women's quarters.. .Hegai, the king's eunuch 2.4: girl Greenstein 1.10: the seven eunuchs attending before the king Ahashveirosh 2.3: house of women.. .Heigeh, the king's eunuch 2.4: girl Fox 1.10: 2.3: 2.4:

the seven eunuchs who attended the king harem...Hegai the King's Eunuch maiden

Bush 1.10: 2.3: 2.4:

the seven eunuchs who personally waited upon him harem.. .Hegai, the king's eunuch young woman

Levenson 1.10: the seven eunuchs in attendance upon the person of King Ahasuerus 2.3: harem quarters... Hegai, the king' s eunuch 2.4: maiden

The change from 'chamberlain' to 'eunuch' is widely accepted in English versions from the 1920s on; some, notably RSV and Gordis, combine the two terms, which together reflect who these individuals were and what they did. The traditional 'house of the women', a literal rendering of the Hebrew phrase, has been jettisoned in favor of 'harem' or occasionally 'women's quarters' or some such term. 'Chamberlain' and 'house of the woman' put forth a rather prim image, one more at home in Buckingham

GREENSPOON From Maidens and Chamberlains

241

Palace than the Persian court of Susa. There is nothing wrong with the rendering 'maiden'; 'young woman' is equally appropriate. The use of 'girl' in this context may lead some readers to picture a very young female, an image apparently not in the mind of the author, who fully intended to include sleeping with the king as part of the contest by which the next queen was selected. Conclusions In the final analysis, my study is most compelling as a survey of the types of examples and passages careful readers and scholars examine when evaluating a given English version of the Hebrew Bible. By putting together the examples cited here for a specific translation, readers of this article will arrive at some idea of the features that distinguish one version (or family of versions) from another. But there is no substitute for the joys—and, in some cases, frustrations—of reading a translation in its entirety. Although I have stressed the descriptive nature of this enterprise, individuals or groups of individuals are more likely, and justifiably so, to make value judgments prior to purchase or extensive use of an English Bible. Whatever the choice, it is well to keep in mind the words of Esther's prayer, as recorded in the expanded Greek version: 'O God, whose might is over all, hear the voice of the despairing and save us from the hand of evildoers. And save me from my fear!'(14.19 RSV).

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Zimmerli, Walter 1983 Ezekiel (2 vols.; Hermeneia; Philadelphia: Fortress Press).

INDEXES

INDEX OF REFERENCES

OLD TESTAMENT

Genesis 12.17-20 14 15 20 22 24.16 25.20 28.6 28.10-17 30.27-43 31.42 31.53 34 39^1 39.2 39.3 39.23

81 81 81 81 140 130 114 114 81 81 89 89 73 81 81 81 81

Exodus 6.25 12.35-36 12.46 16.10 33.11

114 85 85 81 130

Leviticus 16.6 19.29

114 129

Deuteronomy 2.25 11.25 12.5 21.17

89 89 82 87

25.5-10 32.20 32.30

73 27 26

Joshua 2 2.9 2.11 2.24 9.24 11.23 21.44 22.4 23.1

89 89 89 89 89 90 90 90 90

Judges 2.14 3.8 4-5 4.2 4.9 6.15 10.7 14.3

27 26 69 26 26,27 87 26 114

1 Samuel 4.7 15.1-33 25.42-43

89 64 114

2 Samuel 12.3 14.4-17 16.19

114 64 98

1 Kings 4.15

8.27

114 82

1 Chronicles 4.18 5.27-41 6.1-47MT 6.1-15 6.16-32 6.54-81 MT

114 86 86 86 86 86

2 Chronicles 11.20

114

Ezra 3.2 9-10

86 82

Nehemiah 1.11 2.3-5 5.8 6.18 8 9 12.1

67 80 27 114 82 82 86

Esther [see also below for specific recensions] 1 63, 96, 99, 227 226 1.1 1.2 227 1.5 94,97

259

Index of References 1.8 1.9 1.10

1.11 1.12 1.13-22 1.17 1.18 1.19-20 1.20 1.22 2

2.1-4 2.1 2.2-3 2.2 2.3 2.4

2.5 2.6 2.7

2.8 2.9 2.10

2.11 2.12-14 2.12 2.14 2.15 2.16 2.17-18 2.17

2.18 2.19

124 102 230, 23740 102 72, 23337 102 72 55,87 106 72 72 31,36,38, 39,47,48, 109, 113 93,98 233-37 103, 127 102 237-40 103, 106, 127,23740 87,97 67, 113 63, 94, 116, 12224, 126 93, 94, 97, 98 237 103, 120, 131 112, 131 103 94, 237 96, 103 94 107 96, 104, 109 116, 119, 122, 123, 130 97, 105 2,91,92, 94, 95, 97-99,

2.19-23 2.19-22 2.20

2.21-23 2.21-22 2.21 2.22 2.23 3 3.1 3.4 3.7 3.8 3.9-11 3.9 3.10 3.11 3.12 3.13 3.15 4 4.1 4.2 4.7-8 4.7 4.11 4.14 4.15-16 4.15 4.16

5 5.1 5.9-14 6 6.1-11 6.8

105, 106, 108-10, 134, 135 36 96,97 66, 68, 115, 125, 129-31, 133 2, 33, 34, 38, 48, 66 95 42, 84, 93 39, 120 39, 109 86, 109 109, 179 68, 120 107,22126 15,24,68 27 24, 26, 27 24 24,26 24,86 24,27 97 26, 92, 106, 108 68 41 120 27 106, 107 82 72 68 83, 86, 117, 118, 122, 124, 133 105, 118 64, 104 64 12,38,47, 109 62 13

6.9 6.10-11 6.11 6.12 6.13 7

7.3-4 7.4 7.6 7.10

8 8.1-2 8.1 8.7 8.14 8.15-17 8.17 9 9.2 9.3 9.6-15 9.10 9.13 9.15 9.16 9.17 9.18 9.19 9.22 9.25 9.27 9.28 9.29-10.3 9.29-31 9.29

9.31 9.32 10.3 14.19

13 66 13, 14 14 66 100, 103, 105 104 22,85 63 104,23337 105,233 119 120 120 97 97 66,81,89, 90 97, 105, 233 89 89 97 85 5 85 85,97 97 97 85,97 85,90 94 132 67 105 222 120, 132, 221-26 120,22126 72, 105 73,81 241

MT Esther

1.1 1.10

230 238-41

260 1.12 1.19 2 2.1 2.3 2.4 2.9 2.12 2.15 2.19 2.21-23 2.21 2.22 3.2 3.7 4.14-17 4.14 4.16 6 6.2 7.6 7.10 8.3 9 9.16 9.20-25 9.27 9.29-31 9.29 9.30 9.31 9.32 10.1-3

The Book of Esther in Modern Research 234-37 53 41,48 233-37 238-41 238-41 237 237 52 40 33, 37-40, 43, 47, 48 37 42 40 221-26 52 52 53 48 37 53 233-37 56 222 56 54 53 54, 222 54,22126 54 54 54,22126 54

Alpha/Lucianic Esther 2 38,39,45, 47 2.22 42 2.23 42 3.1 55 3.5-8 55 4.2 55 4.9 55 4.10 55 4.11 55

4.14-18 5 5.4-5 5.4 5.5-6 5.9-10 5.12-29 6 6.1-12 6.6 6.10 6.13-18 6.21 7.1 7.4 7.11 7.33-38 7.46 8.2 8.15-17 8.18-29 8.19 8.20-21 8.22-32 8.33-38 8.53-59

55 56 55 56 56 55,56 55 47 55 57 41 55 55 55 45 45 47 42 57 56 55 56 56 55 55,57 55

Alpha/Lucianic Esther Additions Add. A. 2 41 41 ll-16a 12-16a 38 12 42 14 42 15 42, 46, 47 40,47 16b-17 16b 47 17a 40

Add. E 1 2

46 46

LXX Esther 1.15 1.19 2

45 45 39,41-45

2.19 2.21-23 2.21 2.22 2.23 3 3.2 3.6 3.12 3.14 4.5 6 6.1 6.2-3 6.2 6.4 6.10 7 7.49 7.50 8 9 9.13 9.20 9.23 9.24 9.27 9.28 9.32 10.2 16.10

41 33,3741,43,48 39,44 42 39, 42, 45 44 45 42 45 45 45 43, 44, 48 66 37 44 43 41 47 42 42 46 47 42 40, 46, 47 46 40 42 42 42 42 179

LXX Esther Additions Add. A 1 38 1-17 34, 36-39, 43,48 1-16 37 1-11 36 1-3 36 2 41 4-10 36 11-18 35 11-17 36 12 41,42 14b 39 14 42

Index of References 15 16 17

40,42 39,41 44

Add. B 6

45

Add. C 13 15

39,64 69

Add. D 1-5 8 9-10

64 66 72

Add. E 1 2 3 10 23

46 46 44 40 42

Psalms 22 22.1 29.3 31.19 44.12 137.1-6

11 118 132 132 27 80

Proverbs 3.35 7.5-6 7.21-23 10.22 10.27 11.8 12.19-21 16.18 20.1-2 25.7

84 84 75 89 89 89 84 84 83 84

26.27

84

Ecclesiastes 7.29 9.11 10.13 12.12

135 7 84 3

Isaiah 40-55

88

Jeremiah 22.30 29-30

86 80

Lamentations 1.1-8 77 5.3 114 5.21-22 78 Ezekiel 11.16 34.23 37 37.12-14 37.24 43-44 44.15-31 48.35

82 86 141 80 86 82 86 88

Daniel 2.47 3.28 4.2-3 4.34-37 5.17 6 6.26-27 9

88 88 88 88 88 80 88 80

Haggai 1.1

86

261 Zechariah 4.6 14.9

86 88

Ma lac hi

1 3.8-12

82 82

Apocrypha/DeuteroCanonical 1 Esdras 2.5-6 80 210 3^ Judith 1.1 5.20 6.2-9 8.2-5 8.7 8.8 8.10 8.11-27 8.31 9.1 9.2-14 9.10 9.13 10.3-4 12.1-2 12.7-8 12.10-20 12.18 13.6-9 13.16 14.6-10 16.19

62 66 65 74 63 68 73 68 74 68 68 64 64 64 68 68 64 63 63 74 74 69

2 Maccabees 5.36

138

262

The Book of Esther in Modern Research ANCIENT, RABBINIC AND CLASSICAL LITERATURE

New Testament Matthew 27.46 118 Mishnah Abot 5.3

148

Yoma 1.1 20b

114 148

b. Megillah 10b-17a 12b 13a

y. Ta'anit 4 68b

148 148

Midrash Abba Gory on 2 139 lOa 117 'Aggadat 'Ester 2.8 112 'Aharei mot 8.6

Ecclesiastes Kabbah 1.1 12

13b 15a 16a 31b b. Qiddusin 41a

115

b. Sanhedrin 73a 74a-b 74b

129 119 119

b. Yebamot 108a

116

Esther Rabbah 1.1 12 6.5 113 6.8 131 6.9 139 Genesis Rabbah 1.5 132 129 12.4 129 30.8 129 113 39.13 113 52.3 112 Lamentations Rabbah 5.3 114 Midrash Tehillim 22.3 120 22.23 113 Panim 'Aherim B33a 117

114

Pirke deRabbi Eliezar 49-50 11 Seder 'Olam 29

11

Soperim 7.5

148

Yalqut Shim 'oni 2.1056 117 Other Rabbinic Sources Shulhan arukh, Orah hayyim 695.2 187

114

132

11, 113 72, 103 113, 114, 117, 119, 120, 126, 139, 187 124, 131 117, 118 14,63 116

b. Yoma 2a

133

148

Nedarim 8b

Talmud b. 'Erubin 64a

y. Megillah 1.1

Zohar (Ra 'ay a meheimnd), Ki tese 276a 112 Zohar Wa-yishlah 1.169a 134 Aristotle Poetics 1451 139

139

Herodotus 1.99 107 1.135 99 3.31-36 3.31-32 3.67-79 3.69

107 99 99 101 178 101

Index of References 3.72 3.77 3.84 3.88 3.118 7.10 7.39 7.114 8.90 8.118-19

9.107 9.108 9.109 9.110-11

107 107 107 101 107 99 99 101 99 99 99 101 101 101

9.110 9.111-13 9.111

100 101 100

Homer Odyssey 17.392

29

Josephus Ant. 11.207-208 11.295 11.6.3

36 120 107

OTHER SOURCES Milton

Paradise Lost 29 6.178 Samson Agonistes 268 29

Shakespeare Julius Caesar I.ii.101 28 III.iii.79 8

263 Plutarch Artaxery.es 14 16 17 19 23 26-27 26 27

101 101 101 101 101 101 100, 101 101

Strabo Geography 15.3.20

87

INDEX OF AUTHORS

aLapide, C.C. 25,26 Aliut,A.J. 185 Alkabetz, S. 125, 128-30, 132, 133, 135 Arama, I. 125 Arazo, M.A. 193 Asano-Tamanoi, M. 83 Attwater, D. 182 Bailey, L.R. 219 Bakhtin, M. 14, 187 Baldwin,;. 27 Ball, C.J. 4 Ballman, E.A. 177 Baly, D. 77 Bardtke, H. 39 Baumgartner, A.I. 137 Beal, T.K. 115,201,205 Bellis, A.O. 73 Ben-Dov, J. I l l ben Eliezer, T. 132 ben Judah of Worms, E. 129, 132 Bercovitch, S. 196 Berg, S.B. 6, 85 Berger, M. 121 Berlin, A. 9 Bickerman, E.J. 37 Bobrick, B. 217 Bodian, M. 186 Bratcher, R.G. 219,221 Brenner, A. 6, 101 Bronner, L. 6, 111 Buber, M. 226 Bush, F.W. 219,221,237 Bustamante, A.H. 185 Campa, A.L. 184, 185 Cannata, P. 181 Cardenas, B. 183

Carroll, M. 181, 182 Cassel,P. 92,93 Chavez, A. 187 Chandler, L.B. 51,71,213 Child, H. 190 Clines, D.J.A. 6, 17, 20, 27, 36, 37, 55, 86,102 Coffey, L.M. 192 Colles, D. 190 Cook, H.J. 36 Craig, K. 6, 194 Craven, T. 75 Crawford, S.W. 6, 67, 68, 111 (see also White, S.) Crim, K.R. 219 Darr, K. 6 Day, L.M. 6,50 De Troyer, K. 6, 48, 49, 71, 103, 237 DeWaard, J. 219,226 Dorothy, C. 6 DuBois, E.G. 213 Durant, W. 180 Eilberg-Schwartz, H. 182 Elbaum, J. 128, 133-35 Elliott, J.H. 186 Englebert, O. 182 Estes, D.C. 198 Faragher, J.M. 208 Fehrenbacher, D.E. 208 Finkel, J. I l l Fishlock, A.D.H. 183, 184 Fox,M. 121 Fox, M.V. 6, 38, 50, 54, 55, 59, 60, 64, 89,94,98, 105, 115, 121,219 Friedlander, G. 14

Index of Authors Friedman, A.B. 196 Friedman, M.A. 114 Frymer-Kensky, T. 59 Fuchs, E. 50,71 Fuerst, W.J. 177 Fuller, J.M. 4 Gallico, E. 126 Gaster, T.H. 176, 194 Gelles, B. 122 Gerleman, G. 85 Gilmore, A. 219 Ginzberg, L. 11, 150 Gitay, Z. 105 Gitlitz,D. 186, 187 Godley, A.D. 99 Goitein, S.D. 79 Gordis, R. 93,219 Gordon, L. 212 Gottlieb, I.E. 115 Greenspoon, L.J. 219-21, 226 Greenstein, E.L. 122, 136, 219, 226 Grossfeld, B. 11, 14-16 Gutierrez, R.A. 185 Hacker, J. 125 Haelewyck, J.-C. 37, 137 Hagg,T. 59 Haller, M. 51 Hanhart, R. 55 Herbert, A.S. 219 Herrenschmidt, C. 100 Hertz,J. 219 Hills, M.T. 219 Holweck, F.G. 181 Horowitz, C. 121, 135 Humphreys, W.L. 85

Klein, L.R. 108 Kohler, K. 210-13 Kossmann, R. 38-41 Kubo, S. 219 LaCocque, A. 65 Laffey, A.L. 50,71 Langston, S. 202, 207 Laniak, T. 12,62,81,84,85,87,100, 104, 105 Lawee, E. 121 Leibowitz, N. 122 Leucht, I.L. 202-204, 206-209 Levenson, J.D. 6, 66, 79, 80, 86, 90, 93, 102, 107, 112, 115, 124,219 Levine, A.-J. 75 Lewis, J.P. 219 Lewy, J. 137 Lindow, J. 195 Loew, J. ben Bezalel 134 Malone, B. 205 Marcus, J.R. 200,204 Margolis, M.L. 221 Marshall, I.H. 26 McConville, J.G. 26 McGrath,A. 217 McLuhan, M. 22 McMahon, A.L. 180 McPherson, J.M. 208 Menn, E.M. 118 Meyer, M.A. 204,209 Milne, P. 75 Moore, C.A. 3-5, 26, 36, 55, 70, 92-94, 111,219,237 Moses, A.J. 214,215 Murphy, R. 89 Myers, J.M. 3

IbnYahya, J. 126 Jacobs, C.F. 197 Jarque, F. 193 Jobes,K.H. 6, 104, 105, 107 Kamin, S. 112, 118, 122, 123 Kaslow, A.J. 197 Kerber, L.K. 212 Kerr,J.S. 219

265

Narkiss, B. 144 Nash, R.N. Jr 219 Neulander, J.S. 186, 199 Nickelsburg, G. 37 Nida, E.A. 219,226 Nidel, D.S. 186, 188, 189 Noss, P.A. 227 O'Crouley, P.A. 185

266

The Book of Esther in Modern Research

Omanson, R.L. 227 Orlinsky, H.M. 219,221 Paton,L.B. 50,76,92-94, 115 Perrin, B. 100

Rad, G. von 85 Rahaman, Y. 122 Rosenthal, L.A. 85 Rosenzweig, F. 226 Roth,C. 142 Rouanet, L. 184 Sanchez Siscart, M. 183 Saperstein, M. 121 Sarna, J.D. 219 Sarna, N. 219 Schauss, H. 194 Scott, J.C. 193 Segal, E. 11, 14, 113, 114, 116, 117, 120, 121,129 Septimus, B. 121 Shalem, S. 128 Sheeley, S.M. 219 Signer, M.A. 123 Singerman, R. 219 Soltes, O. 144 Spadafora, F. 181 Specht, W.F. 219

Stafford Wright, J. 26 Stanton, B.C. 51,71,213 Stearne, A.W. 179 Stocker, M. 76 Szasz, P.M. 197 Talmage, F. 121 Talmon, S. 83-85, 111 Thompson, S. 177 Tigay, J. 37 Torrey, C.C. 36 Tov, E. 32,33,36, 111,221 Tzahalon, Y.T. 127 Uceda, S. b. Isaac 126, 127 VanderKam, J.C. 217 Walfish, B.D. 11, 16, 112, 121, 122, 125 Weinfeld, M. 84 Welter, B. 211 White, S. 6, 51, 63, 69, 78 (see also Crawford, S.) Wills, L.M. 58,59,67 Wyler,B. 102-104 Zaeske, S. 51 Zimmerli, W. 82

JOURNAL FOR THE STUDY OF THE OLD TESTAMENT SUPPLEMENT SERIES 343 J. Andrew Dearman and M. Patrick Graham (eds.), The Land that I Will Show You: Essays on the History and Archaeology of the Ancient Near East in Honor ofj. Maxwell Miller 345 Jan-Wim Wesselius, The Origin of the History of Israel: Herodotus' Histories as Blueprint for the First Books of the Bible 346 Johanna Stiebert, The Construction of Shame in the Hebrew Bible: The Prophetic Contribution 347 Andrew G. Shead, The Open Book and the Sealed Book: Jeremiah 32 in its Hebrew and Greek Recensions 348 Alastair G. Hunter and Phillip R. Davies, Sense and Sensitivity: Essays on Reading the Bible in Memory of Robert Carroll 350 David Janzen, Witch-hunts, Purity and Social Boundaries: The Expulsion of the Foreign Women in Ezra 9—10 351 Roland Boer (ed.), Tracking the 'Tribes ofYahweh': On the Trail of a Classic 352 William John Lyons, Canon and Exegesis: Canonical Praxis and the Sodom Narrative 353 Athalya Brenner and Jan Willem van Henten (eds.), Bible Translation on the Threshold of the Twenty-First Century: Authority, Reception, Culture and Religion 354 Susan Gillingham, The Image, the Depths and the Surface: Multivalent Approaches to Biblical Study 356 Carole Fontaine, Smooth Words: Women, Proverbs and Performance in Biblical Wisdom 357 Carleen Mandolfo, Go d in the Dock: Dialogic Tension in the Psalms of Lament 359 David M. Gunn and Paula N. McNutt, 'Imagining'Biblical Worlds: Studies in Spatial, Social and Historical Constructs in Honor of James W. Flanagan 361 Franz V. Greifenhagen, Egypt on the Pentateuch's Ideological Map: Constructing Biblical Israel's Identity 364 Jonathan P. Burnside, The Signs of Sin: Seriousness of Offence in Biblical Law 369 Ian Young (ed.), Biblical Hebrew: Studies in Chronology and Typology 371 M. Patrick Graham, Steven L. McKenzie and Gary N. Knoppers (eds.), The Chronicler as Theologian: Essays in Honor of Ralph W. Klein 372 Karl Moller, A Prophet in Debate: The Rhetoric of Persuasion in the Book of Amos 374 Silvia Schroer and Sophia Bietenhard (eds.), Feminist Interpretation of the Bible and the Hermeneutics of Liberation 379 Mark W. Bartusch, Understanding Dan: An Exegetical Study of a Biblical City, Tribe and Ancestor 380 Sidnie White Crawford and Leonard J. Greenspoon (eds.), The Book of Esther in Modern Research