Zissi Skarzhinskaya
There are other female characters in Megillat Esther as well.
The girls and women who were gathered for Achashverosh’s harem so that he could choose a wife spent a year undergoing all kinds of treatments: “Six months with oil of myrrh and six months with perfumes and women’s cosmetics” (Esther, 2:12). The Midrash (Yalkut Shimoni, 2) relates that many people sought to send their daughters to the harem in the hope that the king would choose them. Each girl believed that she herself knew perfectly well what she needed to charm the king: “Whatever she asked for was given to her, so that she (could) take it with her from the women’s house to the king’s house” (ibid., 13). But none guessed what Achashverosh liked—either in outfits or in gifts.
Here, too, we find an important piece of advice. Sometimes a husband and wife have different views of what is beautiful.
She likes one thing; for example, she thinks pink suits her. But her husband cannot stand the color pink, especially his wife wearing pink. It is better not to take chances, but to find out what your husband’s tastes are.
Megillat Esther—or, more precisely, Midrash Rabbah (9:4)—also describes how Haman, having prepared the tree, went to see what Mordechai was doing and found him sitting in the beit midrash. Boys, his students, sat around Mordechai, wrapped in sackcloth, studying Torah and weeping. Haman counted them, and there turned out to be 1000 (or 12000, or 22000). He ordered them to be put in chains and posted guards, deciding that the next day he would hang the children first and then Mordechai. Their mothers came and brought them food. They pleaded: eat, so that you do not starve to death before they hang you tomorrow! But the children placed one little hand in the sacred book they were studying and swore by Mordechai’s life that they would not eat, but would die fasting. Then the mothers wept together with their children. Their weeping rose higher and higher until the Almighty heard it. The L-rd moved from the throne of Judgment to the throne of Mercy and asked: “What is this loud voice that I hear, sounding like young goats and lambs?” Moshe Rabbeinu appeared before the Almighty and said that these were not young goats and lambs, but little children of Your people, who were on their third day of fasting, and whom the enemy wanted to kill the next day like young goats and lambs.
At that very moment, the Almighty took the decree against them, bearing a clay seal, broke the seal, and tore up the decree.
It turns out that the mothers, who were themselves fasting, summoned their last reserves of strength to bring food to their children. They knew that the entire people was in danger, but had no idea that Haman would start with their children. And now, with their children in danger, these Jewish mothers want to give their little ones, who are studying Torah, at least some bread and water as a final treat. Thank G-d, our children are not in danger, and we can welcome them back from the beit midrash and give them treats, so that they will feel how important their Torah study is to us.
At last, we have reached Esther.
Esther-Hadassah. The only one in all of Tanakh who received both chen and chesed—grace and favor (Esther, 2:17)—from the King. Chen does not depend on a person’s deeds; it is granted only by the Almighty. Manot HaLevi (2:15) writes that Esther conducted herself modestly and ate kosher food, and that was why she was given chen. Maharil writes that no person ever possessed chen and chesed together—only Esther did. That is why the piyyut (Ha-Aderet Veha-Emunah by Rav Meshullam ben Kalonymus) says “Ha-chen veha-chesed le-Chai olamim,” “grace and favor belong to the One Who gives life to the worlds.” And although Esther had them, it was only for that time. (It is also written that Yosef had “chen and chesed,” but only in Yaakov’s eyes; in his brothers’ eyes, it was the opposite.)
There is much to say about Esther. For example, she devised a way to conceal the fact that she did not work on Shabbat. She named the seven girls assigned to her after the days of the week (with an allusion to the creation of the world) and scheduled them so that only one would come each day. Each day Esther did some kind of work so that she would not grow bored (and be led into sin), and six of the girls thought her industrious. On the seventh day she rested, and the seventh girl thought she was idling, as befitted a queen.
As Rabbi Akiva said, our matriarch Sarah lived a righteous life for 127 years, while her great-great… granddaughter Esther ruled over 127 countries.
And like our matriarch Rivkah, Esther knows how to take responsibility. She orders the entire people to fast on the first day of the festival of Pesach. This can be done only on the basis of prophecy. Rivkah says to Yaakov: «alai», «upon me be your curse, my son», because Rivkah was told in a prophecy who would receive the blessings (Targum Onkelos). And Esther says: «tzumu, alai», meaning «fast, the responsibility for a mistake will fall upon me»—I have received such a prophecy.
She also knows how to remain silent and keep secrets. Like our matriarch Rachel, who did not reveal that Leah was standing under the chuppah in her place, and like Binyamin, Rachel’s son, who kept from Yaakov the fact that Yosef was alive. On the other hand, Mordechai persuades her that there are times when one must step forward: “For if you remain silent at such a time, (then) relief and deliverance will come to the Jews from another place, but you and your father’s house (meaning King Shaul, who spared Agag) will perish” (Esther, 4:14).
Sefat Emet writes that Purim is a preparation for the future redemption: “And it seems to me that by inviting Haman to the feast, Esther weakened the attribute of judgment within him, as it says later: ‘And Haman went out… happy and in good spirits’; this weakened his weapon” (Purim 762).
Since Esther prepared a feast for the future redemption, to weaken Haman, and since, according to Sefat Emet, every Purim we celebrate and every meal we prepare is also a preparation for it, we certainly have reason to rejoice!
[Every Purim a Jewish homemaker prepares and sends shalach manos—how much joy this brings both to others and to herself, but it must be done “from the heart”! The homemaker gives a coin to everyone who asks. How this increases the joy of this bright day! The joy of the festive meal is due in large measure to the homemaker; it is a preparation for the joy of the coming redemption!—Editor’s note.]
Prepared by Mrs. Zissi Skarzhinskaya