She notes that Josephus only knew this queen by her Greek name, Alexandra, while the Rabbis only knew her by her Semitic name. BC (he would have already been well over 90 years old at this The Rabbis view this as self-sacrifice on Esthers part, since she was willing to die herself, provided that Haman would also perish; (4) Esther sought to turn Haman into her ally, so that he would not rebel against Ahasuerus the king (and thereby become even more dangerous); (5) Esther wanted to obscure her identity and prevent any suspicion of her being a Jew (since Haman was an antisemite); (6) Esther desired to arouse the Jews to pray and cry out to God, so they would not think that her presence in the royal palace sufficed to neutralize Hamans activity; (7) Esther sought to arouse Gods compassion, to show that the Jews did not oppose Haman, that no one stood in Hamans way, and therefore only He could deliver Israel; (8) Esther hoped that Ahasuerus, who was a capricious king, would change his opinion of Haman (BTMegillahloc. They married in 478 BC after the former queen, Vashti, was banished for being unable to fulfill her husband's demands. Nonetheless, in the very same document in which the rabbis rule out the possibility of Jewish queens, the rabbis remember Queen Shelamzion Alexandra quite favorably. This prayer also mentioned her situation, which contrasted with that of Sarah andRebekah: they were taken for a single night to the court of a foreign king and miracles were performed for them. even met her a few times when He was a young boy. With great courage, Esther fasts for three days, arranges a banquet with the king and Haman, then pleads with the king to save the Jews. Esther then initiated a covert plan to defeat Haman using her grace and beauty. Thisdevarbuilds on Ilans work: her oeuvre is well known to academics but is not as well known as it could be tothe reading public. She had one son with Esthers story culminates when the beloved queen is faced with the decision to either continue to disguise her Jewish heritage and maintain her safety or jeopardize everything to advocate for her people. Esther risked her life to save the Jews, thus, she became an example of unselfishness and faithfulness. The Rabbis devote extensive attention to Esthers observance of the laws of niddah. Rachel is first mentioned in the Hebrew Bible in Genesis 29 when Jacob happens upon her as she is about to water her father's flock. How old was King Xerxes when he married Esther? In Jacobs blessing to his sons, he blesses Benjamin(Gen. 49:27): Benjamin is a ravenous wolf; in the morning he consumes the foe, and in the evening he divides the spoil, which the Rabbis applied to Mordecai and Esther. Commenting on Deuteronomy 11:13-14, which describes rain falling in its season as a reward for keeping the commandments, Sifre Deuteronomy writes (42): In other words, Rabbi Nathan observes that in the days of Queen Shelamzion, the people actually obeyed the commandmentsthey were all good for a change!and God rewarded the Israelites with plentiful rain from heaven. After Esthers coronation, the king continues to gather virgins in his palace, which the Rabbis understand as an activity meant to reveal Esthers identity. This shows that her selection was part of the divine plan; Esther was meant to rule in order to bring deliverance to all Israel (Lit. Ilan relies upon Bickermans dating, as does Aaron KollersEsther in Ancient Jewish Thought(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014). After recently suffering with a bad. The Queen was the oldest monarch to have reigned in Britain before she passed away in September 2022, aged 96. Let us know. Through his actions, along with those of his cousin Esther, the Jews were saved from extermination. Mordecai and Esther respond to this that the story in the Book of Esther was already recorded in the Annals of the Kings of Media and Persia(Esth. Esther was a teenager in After he had Vashti killed, all the lands rebelled against him; once he married Esther, one hundred and twenty-seven lands came under his rule once again, and when he appointed Mordecai as viceroy, they all returned to him (Midrash Tehilim, onPs. How old was Queen Esther when she died? - Answers The Jewish festival of Purim celebrates this event. She never forgot her cousin Mordecai and she never forgot that she was one of God's children. Her name was Shelamzion Alexandra. old, non-virgin wife. After the immediate danger to her community passed, Queen Esther stayed with Ahasuerus. He was a Jew living in the Persian city of Susa, and he became a prime minister in the Persian court of King Ahasuerus. Esther replaced Queen Vashti, who had been sentenced to death because she had refused to display her beauty to the King's feast attendants. No biblical law specifies that only men can reign, although hundreds of years after Shelamzions reign, the rabbis of would interpret Deuteronomy 17:14, which states You will set a king over you as a king, not a queen (Sifre Deuteronomy 157).[3]. Esther may or may not have reflected the historical reality of the Persian period, but her story provided a model for a new reality in Shelamzions lifetime. An orphan raised by her uncle, young Esther was taken against her will as a beautiful virgin to Persian King Ahasuerus's harem. It is most unlikely that there ever was a Queen Esther, in which She was married to King Achashverosh, whom some identify as Artaxerxes (), 1 king of Persia. She had two grown sons (Aristobulus and Hyrcanus II), but she decided not to step aside for them; perhaps she foresaw that the rivalry between the younger and older son would not end well. Esthers jar is a visual representation of her emotional turmoil and her suffering. Corrections? [4] Tal Ilan devotes a chapter to discussing the name Shelamzion inSilencing the Queen, 259ff. Josephus tells us that she was loved by the masses of the Jewish people (Jewish Antiquities 13:407). In the midrashic account, Ahasuerus initially ruled the entire world. For an analysis of these sources and their reliability, see Tal Ilan,Integrating Women into Second Temple History(Tbingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1999), esp. We don't know, though tradition teaches that she lived a long life. Some may have stumbled upon the street named after her in downtown Jerusalem, but otherwise, she is generally only briefly mentioned, marginalized, and almost written out of the historical record. He deposed Queen Vashti in 483/482BC when he was 36 ( Esther 1:3 ). The Midrash adds that Esther's father died during her mother's pregnancy, and the latter died during childbirth ( Esth. Dont miss the latest essays from TheTorah.com. Whereas her husband had persecuted the Pharisees, in her reign as solitary queen, Shelamzion was particularly supportive of the Pharisees, promoting their vision of Judaism and perhaps ensuring their popularity for generations to come (Josephus, Jewish War 1:110). Esther Bible | Fun Trivia Questions | Page 5 | Old Testament / Tanakh She was alone, alone with her grief and trauma. Haman (the bad guy) represented the Jews' first enemy Ernest Normand/Wikipedia Esther's story is full of symbolism, which really helped the case for being accepted into the Bible. I'm also Seeking a new queen, the king appointed commissioners to bring all the beautiful young virgins from every province into his harem for a year of cosmetic treatments so that he might select a new bride. cit.). Queen Elizabeth II, the UK's longest-serving monarch, has died at Balmoral aged 96, after reigning for 70 years. Mordechais loyalty and faithfulness to the King were key elements in the unfolding of the events. ), or her strength wanedPirkei de-Rabbi Eliezer[ed. 100-105 and 127-154. Additional traditions maintain that not only did Esther become pregnant by Ahasuerus, but she was also the mother of the last Darius (idem) or of Cyrus (Kallah Rabbati2:15). 10:2). Esther stood in the middle of the fourth department; the guards of the first department could no longer touch her, while those of the last department could not yet approach her. Who was with the Queen when she died? | Daily Mail Online What is the answer punchline algebra 15.1 why dose a chicken coop have only two doors? Queen Esther and Mordecai were given Haman's estate. She was 96 years old. [11] According to the colophon to Greek Esther, a delegation of Jews from Jerusalem went to Egypt with the translation of the story of Megillat Esther and asked the Jews of Alexandria to begin celebrating the festival of Purim. [6] Josephus writes: Alongside Queen Alexandra, and gaining power with her, were the Pharisees, an important sector of the Jewish community who were considered more religious than the rest of the nation and stricter in the observance and interpretation of the Laws (trans. The midrash compares Esther to a hind and to the dawn, based onPs. The recitation of Megillat Esther during the topsy-turvy holiday of Purim can distract us from the serious side of this story and Queen Esthers example. Immediately upon her death, her sons fought over the throne, eventually inviting in Rome, and Judea never regained full independence until the modern state of Israel. The Rabbis compare Esther to the son of the uncle who redeems an ancestral landholding(Lev. Esther turns in prayer to God and compares the situation of the Jews of Persia to that of the Jews in Egypt: in Egypt the Jews cried out and were answered; and in Persia, they fasted, prayed and cried out over their tribulation and the decree that was harsher than that during the time of the Egyptian servitude. Esther replaced Queen Vashti, who had been sentenced to death because she had refused to display her beauty to the King's feast attendants. The bleeding jar in Esthers story is significant because of the deep symbolism behind it. Bible Survey - Esther - Livingstone Fellowship The legal corpus of Jewish laws and observances as prescribed in the Torah and interpreted by rabbinic authorities, beginning with those of the Mishnah and Talmud. Jewish and Persian Later, when Haman planned to hang Mordecai, the king found out that it was Mordecai who had uncovered a plot to assassinate him, so he reversed the orders, hanged Haman instead and gave Mordecai the harem. Esther despaired throughout her first six years in the palace.
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