Reading Assignment
Things To Consider
- There are a lot of banquets in the book of Esther.
- This bureaucracy was extensive and this banquet would have shown that and could very well have been used to plan military strategies.
- Persian banquets might have 15,000 guests – this is no small party.
- The queen threw her own feast as well for the women.
- We don't know exactly the reason but refusal of the King in a public setting was a massive breach of royal etiquette.
- Vashti is deposed but not killed for the son she has with the king will eventually take the throne.
- The next idea is to replace the queen with a new one.
- All the details are worked out for the way these women would identified and organized.
- Then we get to the point – God's chosen people the Jews.
- Mordecai and his orphaned cousin Esther, the beautiful.
- Esther was chosen but she did not let people know that she was a Jew per her instructions.
- The king likes her so much that he makes her the new queen and to celebrate nobody has to pay taxes.
- Small important detail at the close of chapter 2 – Mordecai uncovers a plot, the king is saved and it is written down.