The Miracle of Purim: Human Heroes and Hybrid Identities

Abraham Infeld stated that “Jews don’t have history; Jews have memory.” This is a fundamental distinction: history is objective observation of past events, while memory is the way communities choose to relive, again and again, key events that influenced and shaped them. Holidays are tools for members of the Jewish community to remember the formative events in their lives as a people. Just as at Passover we are required to “see ourselves as if we personally came forth from Egypt,” so Purim invites us, not simply to relate what happened, but to re-experience the impending harm to the Jewish community, and the ways through which the disaster was averted. Jewish memory has shaped the Purim holiday through three central themes.

Remember Me

According to the Sages, it was Esther who asked the Jewish community to write the Megillah, so that they would remember her: “Esther said to the sages: Write [of] me for generations, so they will remember the miracle that happened through me” (Yalkut Shimoni).

But while Jewish communities in every area ruled by King Ahasuerus were saved from Haman’s attempted extermination, and continued to live peaceful Jewish lives, Esther herself was required to make a real sacrifice for the salvific miracle of Purim. Until the end of her life, she remained married to King Ahasuerus, whose attitude toward women in general and his wives in particular placed her in mortal danger at every moment. According to one interpretation in the Talmud (Tractate Megillah: 13), she continued to maintain a relationship with Mordechai at the same time, but did not establish a traditional Jewish family. If she had children, it’s reasonable to assume that they became princes and princesses of Persia.

The Talmud (Tractate Hullin: 139) suggests that the meaning of Esther’s name is found in Deuteronomy (31:18) – “And I will surely hide (haster ‘astir) my face on that day.” Something is withheld from Esther, who did not experience the miracle of complete salvation her Jewish compatriots enjoyed.

During the Purim feast, Hasidim customarily acknowledge Esther’s sacrifice for the Jewish community. They dedicate a song to her that connects two half-verses, one from the Megillah and the other from Psalm (22:2) – “And Esther spoke again before the king, and fell at his feet, and wept, and beseeched him: My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” Purim is, for me, a holiday reminding us to promise Esther, and anyone in danger, that we will refuse to abandon them. Esther’s sacrifice teaches us the duty to remember those who are left behind, even after the community is saved.

Miracles Are Made by Humans

God is certainly not the hero of Megillat Esther; in fact, this is the only biblical book in which the word “God” does not appear. The divine absence is so glaring that over the generations a mystical reading of the Megillah developed, according to which wherever “the king” is mentioned (without specifying his name), the reference is not to Ahasuerus, but to God (Midrash Esther Rabbah, 3:10).

Jewish memory chose to observe one holiday where God is not invited to the party. Moreover, unlike Passover, where it is God who strikes Egypt and divides the Red Sea, at Purim, the miracle is performed by humans.

Esther dares to toy sexually with King Ahasuerus and make him jealous of Haman. She approaches the king and asks for a romantic and intimate “date,” without servants or ministers – just herself, the king, and Haman. We can imagine how surprised the king was by this request. When, during that romantic meeting, he asks Esther again, “What can I do for you, up to half the kingdom,” we can assume that all he wants her to say is: “Let’s meet again, this time just you and me.”

Esther does indeed request another meeting, but again includes Haman. When, at the second meeting, Esther reveals that someone wants to kill her – and points an accusing finger at Haman – King Ahasuerus, full of erotic jealousy, easily gives the order to eliminate Haman.

Is this a miracle? If this were to happen today, I imagine most of the rabbis I know in Israel would preach sermons to the community about the laws of modesty, about how Esther behaves improperly, and that no “daughter of Israel” should emulate her. But Jewish memory saw Esther’s action as a miracle. How many miracles are happening right before our eyes today while we refuse to recognize them as such?

Hybrid Identity

Only two Jewish characters appear in the Book of Esther, and both have hybrid Jewish/Persian identities. Mordechai has a long lineage, knowing the names of his father and grandfather, as far back as Jeconiah, king of Judah. Mordechai does not hide his Judaism (“because he had told them that he was a Jew”). We might expect him to have a proper Jewish name, but the Megillah remembers him as Mordechai – derived from ‘Marduk,’ the patron god of the city of Babylon! For illustration, if the Megillah were written today, we might find that the Jewish hero’s name is “Chris.” No less fascinating is the fact that – unlike most American Jews, who in addition to their non-Jewish American moniker will also have a Jewish name, by which they are called to the Torah – Mordechai has no such Jewish name. “Chris” is simply “Chris.”

Esther, like Mordechai, is also named after a Mesopotamian deity – Ishtar (Talmud, Tractate Megillah 13), the goddess of love, sexuality, and war. Esther does have an additional name – Hadassah – but she too, like Mordechai, is identified in the Megillah primarily by her non-Jewish name. Unlike Mordechai, who knows his lineage well, Esther has no lineage. She is an orphan with no father or mother and only her uncle Mordechai to raise her.

Mordechai asks Esther to remember one thing: not to reveal her Jewish identity. She must present herself simply as an orphan, fatherless and motherless, but also without community. Mordechai understands that something in Esther’s rootlessness will prompt King Ahasuerus to choose her over all the other young women. The fact that she has no family story allows the king to see her as an object rather than a subject.

The midrash (Bamibidbar Rabbah: 13) states that the children of Israel were saved from slavery in Egypt by God because they preserved their Jewish names. But the Book of Esther teaches us that Jews can save themselves, by their own merit and without God, even when their identity is hybrid and their names are derived from other gods as long as they see themselves as part of and responsible to the Jewish people as a whole.

Finding Holiness in Concealment

Some rabbis claim that Purim is the most important of all holidays, surpassing even Yom Kippur. In a word-play on “Yom Kippur,” they find there the expression – “k-Purim”: i.e. Yom Kippur approaches (but does not equal) the importance of Purim (Tikunei Zohar: 57).

Perhaps the rabbis understood that after the destruction of the Temple, divine presence would no longer be revealed as it was at Sinai. Purim is an invitation for every Jew to choose to see holiness, to see God, in the spaces of their own lives, and to take responsibility for this “secular” vision.

The three themes I’ve presented – Esther’s sacrifice and the importance of memory, the miracle made by humans, and the hybrid identity of the heroes – teach us, that even if our given names are not traditionally Jewish, even if our expertise is in sexuality rather than doctrine, and even if personal sacrifices are required of us – God is present in all areas of life, even in concealment, in “Hastara” – as Esther’s name reveals.