Holy Bible

What is thy petition, queen Esther? Esther 7:1-6 Esther's petition T. McCrie, D. D. 1. When called to speak for God and His people, we must summon up our courage, and act with becoming confidence and decision. Had Esther held her peace, under the influence of timidity or false prudence, or spoken with reserve as to the designs against the Jews and their author, she would have been rejected as an instrument of Jacob's deliverance, and her name would not have stood at the head of one of the inspired books. 2. When persons resolve singly and conscientiously to discharge their duty in critical circumstances, they are often wonderfully helped. The manner in which Esther managed her cause was admirable, and showed that her heart and tongue were under a superior influence and management. How becoming her manner and the spirit with which she spoke! 3. It is possible to plead the most interesting of all causes, that of innocence and truth, with moderation and all due respect. The address of Esther was respectful to Ahasuerus as a king and a husband: "If I have found favour in thy sight, O king, and if it please the king." Esther was calm as well as courageous, respectful as well as resolute. 4. It argues no want of respect to those in authority to describe evil counsellors in their true colours in bringing an accusation against them, or in petitioning against their unjust and destructive measures. "The adversary and enemy is this wicked Haman." 5. It is horrible to think and hard to believe that there is such wickedness as is perpetrated in the world. "Who is he, and where is he, that durst presume in his heart to do so?" We might well ask, Who was he that betrayed his master, and where did they live who crucified the Lord of glory? Who or where is he that dares presume to say, even in his heart, "There is no God" — that denies a providence, profanes the name and day of God, turns the Bible into a jest-book, mocks at prayer and fasting, and scoffs at judgment to come? And yet such persons are to be found in our own time. 6. We sometimes startle at the mention of vices to which we ourselves have been accessory. "who is he, and where is he, that durst presume in his heart to do so?" He is not unknown to thee, neither is he far from thee, O king. "Thou art the man!" And how seldom do we reflect on the degree in which we have been accessory to and participant in the sins of Others by our bad example, our criminal silence, and the neglect of those means which were in our power, and which we had a right to employ for checking them. 7. Persecution is not more unjust than it is impolitic. ( T. McCrie, D. D. ) The prudent management of things A. Raleigh, D. D. I. We see THE GREAT IMPORTANCE OF CAPABLE AND PRUDENT MANAGEMENT OF THINGS. Esther's management of these great affairs is evidently consummate. There is an overruling providence, but there is also a teaching wisdom of God, and if we wish to be fully under the protection of the one, we must open all our faculties to receive the other. II. We have in Esther's behaviour A VERY NOTABLE AND NOBLE INSTANCE OF CALM AND COURAGEOUS ACTION IN STRICT CONFORMITY WITH THE PREDETERMINED PLAN. How few women are born into the world who could go through these scenes as Esther does I How many would faint through fear I How many would be carried by excitement into a premature disclosure of the secret! How many would be under continual temptation to change the plan! Only a select few can be calm and strong in critical circumstances, patient and yet intense, prudent and yet resolved. III. HER BOLDNESS TAKES HERE A FORM WHICH IT HAS NOT BEFORE ASSUAGED; IT IS SHOWN IN THE DENUNCIATION OF A PARTICULAR PERSON: "The adversary and enemy is this wicked Haman." Strong language; but, at any rate, it is open and honest and above-board — no whispering into the king's private ear; no secret plotting to supplant the Prime Minister. Every word is uttered in the man's hearing, and to his face. Let him deny, if he can; let him explain, if he can. ( A. Raleigh, D. D. ) Let my life be given me at my petition A plea for life J. Hughes. We have the very same cause for urgency of suit as she had. It behoveth us to say in the presence of another King, "Oh, let my life be given me at my petition." There is a royal law, and under that law our lives are forfeited. Life, in the narrative before us, was about to be taken away unjustly — by force of a most cruel mandate; but it is a holy law that dooms us to death. ( J. Hughes. ) For we are sold A plea for liberty A. Raleigh, D. D. We also ought to sue both for our fives and our liberties. By nature we are the bondmen and bondwomen of sin and Satan. ( A. Raleigh, D. D. ) Who is he, and where is he, that durst presume in his heart to do so? The doings of a wicked heart W. Burrows, B. A. I. A wicked heart INDUCES FOOLHARDINESS. "Who is he, and where is he, that durst presume in his heart to do so?" Haman's daring presumption. A wicked heart is both deceitful and deceiving. II. A wicked heart sooner or later MEETS WITH OPEN CONDEMNATION. III. A wicked heart LEADS TO FEARFULNESS. ( W. Burrows, B. A. ) Moral indignation, A. M. Symington, B. A. being commonly sudden and intense in uttering itself, furnishes strong testimony in favour of the universal principles of God's moral law; but we have need to be careful how we indulge in expression of virtuous wrath. It is safe and wholesome for us to pause and ask whether there is no risk that in judging others we may be condemning ourselves. Ahasuerus will feel ere long that he has uttered his own condemnation. ( A. M. Symington, B. A. ) The adversary and enemy is this wicked Haman The index finger J. Parker, D. D. "The adversary and enemy is this wicked Haman." This is the best way of dealing with every enemy. Definite statements are manageable, but vague charges are never to be entertained. No man makes progress who deals in generalities. The sermon is in the application. The prayer is in the amen. Let us apply this teaching. I. IN THE MATTER OF OUR OWN PERSONAL CHARACTER. 1. Put your finger upon the weak point of your character, and say, "Thy name is Self-indulgence." Tell yourself that you are allowing your life to ooze away through self-gratification. You never say no to an appetite, you never smite a desire in the face. 2. Take it another direction. "The adversary and enemy is this infernal jealousy." Your disease, say to yourself, is jealousy. Speak in this fashion when you have entered your closet and shut your door; say, "I am a jealous man, and therefore I am an unjust man; I cannot bear that that man should be advancing; I hate him; the recollection of his name interferes with my prayers; would God I could lay hold of something I could publish against him, I would run him to death." Yes, this is the reality of the case, God never casts out this devil, this all-devil; only thou canst exorcise this legion. 3. Or take it in some other aspect and say, "The adversary and enemy is this eternal worldliness, that will not let me get near my God." II. WITH REGARD TO PUBLIC ACCUSATIONS. 1. Take it in the matter of public decay.(1) Who in looking abroad upon the country will say, "The adversary and enemy is this wicked liquor traffic"?(2) Or, "The adversary and enemy is this wicked official self-seeking"? 2. Apply the same law to the decline of spiritual power. It is an easy thing to read a paper on this subject, but who names the Haman? What keeps us back?(1) Fear of offending the world. The world ought to be offended. No worldling should ever have one moment's comfort in the house of God. He should feel that unless he is prepared to change his disposition, he is altogether in the wrong place.(2) Sometimes the enemy is doubt in the heart of the preacher himself. The man is divided. His axe is split across the very edge. There is no power in his right arm. When he speaks he keeps back the emphasis. III. WE MIGHT APPLY THE SAME DOCTRINE TO HINDRANCES IN THE CHURCH. The adversary and enemy is this wicked, cold-hearted man. Whenever he comes into the church the preacher cannot preach; he cannot do many mighty works because that man is there, cold, icy, critical. We are afraid to name the adversary in church; we confine ourselves to "proper" words, to "decent" expressions, to euphemisms that have neither beginning nor ending as to practical vitality and force. We are the victims of circumlocution, we go round and round the object of our attack, and never strike it in the face. What we want is a definite, tremendous, final stroke. Esther succeeded. Her spirit can never fail. ( J. Parker, D. D. ) Then Haman was afraid before the king and the queen Guilt cowardly T. McEwan. Haman was now left alone with his righteous accuser. Innocence is courageous, but guilt is cowardly. Men, with the consciousness of having truth and justice on their side, have risen superior to the fear of death, and stood undaunted before wrathful kings. But this man, haughty and hardened in view of the sufferings of others, no sooner sees that evil is determined against himself than he becomes a poor, unnerved trembling suppliant at the feet of her whom he had most grievously wronged. ( T. McEwan. ) Cruel people often cowardly A. Raleigh, D. D. Very cruel people are sometimes very cowardly. Judge Jeffreys could go through his black assize in the West of England, the terror of the land, manifesting the fury of a wild beast; but when the tide turned, and he saw nothing before him but ignominy and disgrace, he sank into a state of abject fear which was pitiable to see. "Haman was afraid before the king and the queen." As he well may be. ( A. Raleigh, D. D. ) And the king, arising from the banquet. Esther 7:7-10 Unexpected results S. H. Tyng, D. D. Man's calculation is always upon the result of his own forethought and skill. There is to be a sure success from the wisdom of his plans. The race is for the swift and the battle is for the strong. Napoleon said, "Heaven is always on the side of the heaviest artillery." The history of human contests would give innumerable illustrations of the contrary. God vindicates His own right to rule by employing the weak things of the world to confound the mighty, and taking the wise in their own craftiness. Haman has illustrated this in a very clear and remarkable manner But Haman's course is not yet complete. "The adversary and enemy is this wicked Haman." Now Haman sees and feels the folly of his malice, however well contrived. He illustrates the ever-remarkable fact, that the boldest oppressor of others is the most cowardly suppliant in a returning danger upon himself. Then said the king, "' Hang him thereon. So they hanged Haman on the gallows that he had prepared for Mordecai. Then was the king's wrath pacified." This closed his career of wickedness. Thus its folly and madness, as well as its guilt and certain ruin, were displayed. "Who hath hardened himself against the Lord, and hath prospered?" "I have seen the wicked in great power, and spreading himself like a green bay tree; yet he passed away, and, lo, he was not. Yea, I sought him, but he could not be found." The prosperity of the wicked is short; the triumph of the ungodly is but for a moment. We see it thus displayed. Why shall we ever be tempted to test it for ourselves? Survey the whole course of this providence as it has passed. 1. It was a train of very trifling circumstances in each particular. There has been no event in the whole succession in itself of a remarkable or unusual character. 2. It was a very circuitous and remote process. The first step we have seen was very far off from the final result, and could not have been imagined to have any connection with it. Every succeeding step seemed equally independent and unlikely to produce the end designed. A wonderful plan was lately proposed for connecting New York and Brooklyn by a bridge, the foundation of which should be in the park. Who that saw men digging and laying stone in the middle of the park, with no knowledge of the plan proposed, could have imagined that it was the starting of a bridge over water so far distant, and to a shore so entirely out of sight? Yet such has been the course of this providence which we have considered. Stop at any point, and the connection is just as hidden, and the calculation of the future remains just as difficult. "Known only unto God are all His works from the beginning." We may stand and ask, Why should the king have selected Esther at the very time of Haman's elevation? Yet every step is sure and leading forward to the result designed. Nothing is lost, and no error is committed upon the road. This is the wonderful skill of Divine providence. The wheels are full of eyes on every side. 3. It was a perfectly unexpected result. Haman had gone through his whole preliminary course with entire success. But how suddenly and wonderfully was he disappointed. 4. God overturns this whole scheme of wickedness without appearing directly to interfere with it in any step of the proceeding. The whole plan wrought out its own result as naturally as the seed of spring brings forth the summer's plant and the autumn's fruit. The sinner was entrapped in his own devices. The sinner was deluded, by his prosperity, to suppose the race was for the swift and the battle to the strong. And yet the whole scheme was overturned in a moment, without one violent interruption occurring in its process. This is a most important lesson to us. It must teach us never to doubt the constant presence of God in all our concerns, and His directing power over all events involved in them. A change of wind may turn the dreaded flame from our habitation, a sudden lull may break the force of the tempest, the very means of apparent death may be made the real instrument of security and protection. And all this may be with no remarkable interference of special Divine power. Thus remarkable in the simplicity of its arrangement, as well as in the perfection of its result, was this whole process of the Divine overthrow of the crafty wickedness of Haman. He was caught in the very pride of his power. Haman was made the instrument of exalting the very adversary he so much hated. The very sorrow which he had prepared for his victim he was himself required to endure. Dr. Mason of New York, describes a remarkable scene of which he was an unexpected witness. A butcher in this city, in his rage with his aged father who had offended him, knocked him down upon the floor, and was dragging him by his hair to throw him into the street. He had pulled him to the outer door, when the old man cried out, "There, stop now, I did not drag him any further," and then confessed that he had abused his own father in the same manner, and dragged him to that very spot, with the same design. Such instances, in some shape, are constantly occurring, so that it is a familiar expectation that the wicked shall fall into the pit they have digged for others, and they who take the sword perish by the sword. The result of this whole providence was complete deliverance and exaltation to the oppressed, and complete destruction to the oppressor. This was the final result, and an illustration of that which will always be, and at last surely be, the final result. God will exalt those whom man oppresses. ( S. H. Tyng, D. D. ) Retributive justice J. S. Van Dyke, D. D. An indestructible connection exists between the violation of Divine law and consequent suffering. A disregard to the conditions of health entails sickness. Poison destroys human life. He who thrusts his hand into the flame invites suffering. A like measure of changelessness marks the operations of moral law. Transgression is followed by suffering. Remorse is entailed by doing what one knows to be wrong. A sense of humiliation succeeds an unreasonable outbreak of anger. Loss of happiness and of self-restraint, and of the esteem of friends, is a portion of the legacy of self-indulgence. A knowledge of this law of retribution is not dependent on revelation. The conviction of its existence is inwoven with human nature. Graven on the conscience, it cannot be effaced. Of the examples of retribution few are more worthy of consideration than that of Haman. This illustrates — I. THE CHANNEL THROUGH WHICH RETRIBUTION COMES. The harvest is garnered: how shall the grain reach the seaboard? Along iron rails laid down by man. The rice-fields are gleaned: how shall the product be conveyed to its destination? Through canals cut by man's agency. The fruits of malice, of cruelty, of ambition, and of tyranny are perfected: how shall they be delivered to him for whom they are designed? Through agencies he himself has prepared — by some human hand to which a higher power has consigned them. Retribution though prepared in heaven, in coming to earth traverses the road which man has made ready for it. The lightning-bolt, though forged in the clouds, may make as it comes to earth a pathway of the tree planted by human hands. Haman's wickedness is so conspicuous that the shafts of retributive justice are certain to strike him, miss whom else they may. Oppression and heartlessness, cherished hatred and the spirit of revenge, are towering upward to such heights that their summits are hidden in clouds already black with fury. The particular person commissioned of Heaven to mete out retributive justice to Haman was Ahasuerus. This is in accordance with God's usual method of dealing. Though bearing the seal of the invisible kingdom, retribution comes through some agency with which we are familiar. The king showed good judgment in the earlier stages of his anger. "In his wrath he went into the palace garden." Anger which speedily vents itself in harsh words is less harmful to its object than that which is repressed till a settled purpose is formed. Fear the man who can so far control his resentment as to be able to exercise good judgment in deciding upon measures which noiselessly bring the results of deeds home to their author. The steam which is generated so speedily as to cause a violent explosion might have proved sufficient, if properly controlled, to convey a long train, freighted with the enginery of death, to some advantageous position whence every missile would have told with deadly effect upon the enemy. II. A FRUITLESS PLEA FOR DELIVERANCE. Haman stood up to make request for his life. Verily no man can tell what awaits him! A few days, a few hours, may suffice to cloud the most brilliant prospects. The question, What new requisition is possible? may be suddenly converted into the anxious inquiry, Can I save anything from the common wreck, even life itself? Haman's prayer, though importunate, was fruitier. The arrival of retribution chronicles the departure of mercy. In the presence of the king even the queen is powerless to rescue the culprit. He is now before the judge whose will is Esther's law. At the day of final adjudication it will no doubt be evident that mercy is powerless to rescue those who have incurred "the wrath of the Lamb." When mercy is driven to assume an attitude of vengeance, hope is for ever extinguished. III. THE SIGNS OF COMING DOOM. Haman's sinful career must be checked, or the queen must perish. Wickedness unchecked would ultimately extinguish goodness. Thistles and grass cannot continuously occupy the same soil, nor is it doubtful which would gain the mastery. "As the word went out of the king's mouth they covered Haman's face." Guilt is left to bear the penalty alone. Alas, the heartlessness of those who are comrades in iniquity! No ingratitude surpasses that of those who have been associated in wickedness. To be deserted in the critical hour is the fate of those who have violated Divine commands. "So they hanged Haman on the gallows he had prepared for Mordecai." He is snared in his own devices. The arrow he directed at another has rebounded, causing his own death. The cannon which, loaded to the muzzle, was to annihilate his enemy, has recoiled, crushing him beneath its ponderous wheels. "As Haman brewed, so he drank." "He made his bed, and he lay in it." Cruelty displayed can have but one issue — cruelty endured. "With what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again." ( J. S. Van Dyke, D. D. ) The fear, the folly, and the doom of the evil-doer W. Burrows, B. A. I. THE EVIL-DOER RECEIVES WARNING. "Haman saw that there was evil determined against him by the king." He clearly heard the sound of the avenging deity though his feet might be shod with wool. Evil-doers receive warning. Nature gives warning. Revelation gives warning. History gives warning. II. THE FOOLISH EVIL-DOER WORKS HIS OWN DESTRUCTION. The very means Haman took to save his life was the means of bringing about his speedy execution. III. THE EVIL-DOER RAISES STRIKING EVIDENCE OF HIS OWN GUILT. "Behold the gallows fifty feet high," etc. IV. THE EVIL-DOER IS PRACTICALLY HIS OWN EXECUTIONER. "So they hanged Haman on the gallows he had prepared for Mordecai." ( W. Burrows, B. A. ) The wicked overthrown S. H. Tyng, D. D. This great fact of Divine government we constantly forget. The person of the Deity is invisible. His ways and plans are not governed by the principles or the expectations of men. But the government is still on His shoulders, and He upholdeth all things by the word of His power. The history of Haman shows us how completely God controls the wicked and makes their crafty and malicious plans result in their own overthrow and ruin. But we come now to consider the peculiar method which God adopted for his overthrow. It is a wonderful illustration of the Divine providence in its minuteness of application. The successive steps in this scheme of counteraction are very minute. It is a regular arrangement of mining and countermining, as in military assaults and sieges. Each successive step is taken in direct reference to the previous motion of the antagonist, and as secretly as possible from him. 1. God lays up in store for His future use Esther's unexpected relation to the king. It was a fearful trial of Mordecai's faith and Esther's piety. It seemed an unaccountable and dark proceeding. Their broken hearts both grieved in bitterness over the dispensation. But God was mercifully preparing for the evil to come. The hold which was allowed upon the affections, and the influence which was thus exercised upon the character of Ahasuerus, were very important in the train of results which was to be brought out. 2. God prepared a special obligation from the king to Mordecai. "Two of the king's chamberlains, of those which kept the door, were wroth, and sought to lay hands on King Ahasuerus," etc. 3. God interposed in the settling of Haman's lot. "They cast the lot from day to day, and from month to month to the twelfth month." This was a very peculiar interposition. It gave nearly a year's delay to the executing of the plan. 4. God gave great ease and apparent prosperity to Haman's plan. The king granted his request at once, and gave him unlimited power to fulfil his purpose. Thus Haman was enticed forward to Perfect security. His success was so flattering to his own power that it led him to an immediate publication of his whole scheme. "There was written according to all that Haman commanded, to the governors that were over every province," etc. 5. God endowed Esther with singular wisdom in arranging her scheme of argument and defence. 6. God awakens the slumbers of the king. "On that night the king could not sleep." What trifling incidents does God employ to accomplish His great results! You will sometimes hear of His providence as if it were only concerned in what men call great events; but there are no distinctions of great and little in human events before God. Never be deluded by any false schemes of men. Not a sparrow falleth to the ground without the notice of your heavenly Father, and the very hairs of your head are all numbered. 7. God remarkably employs the waking king. "The king could not sleep, and he commanded to bring the book of records of the chronicles; and they were read before the king., This was a singular step. He might as readily have called for any other book. 8. God furnished the very agent desired for the accomplishment of His plan. "And the king's servants said unto him, Behold Haman standeth in the court. And the king said, Let him come in." Every step appears to be propitious to Haman. He enters instantly, perfectly secure of the triumphant attainment of his purpose. But God had now perfectly prepared the way for Mordecai's exaltation, and Haman, who had planned his death, must be the instrument of his honour. "God shall judge the righteous and the wicked, for there is a time there for every purpose and for every work." There is providence, and this was its course thus far. Every step is natural, voluntary, trifling in itself. No single step had any apparent earthly connection with the others, in the mind of the one who took it. The threads all seemed perfectly separate and unconnected. But it was a single hand which wove them all. How perfect is the scheme! How indispensable is every part! How clear the wisdom which has ordered the whole! With what confidence we may rely on such a Protector. The eyes of the Lord are in every place, beholding the evil and the good. His eyes are over the righteous, and His ears are open to their prayers. ( S. H. Tyng, D. D. ) The precarious position of princes' favourites J. Trapp. Thus empty vessels swim aloft; rotten posts are gilt with adulterate gold; the worst weeds spring up bravest; and when the twins strive in Rebekah's womb Esau comes forth first, and hath the primogeniture. But while they seek the greatest dignities they most meet with the greatest shame; like apes, while they be climbing they the more show their deformities. They are lifted up also that they may come down again with the greater poise. It was, therefore, well and wisely spoken by Alvarer de Luna, when he told them that admired his fortune and favour with the King of Castile, "You do wrong to commend the building before it is finished, and until you see how it will stand." Princes' favourites should consider with themselves that honour is but a blast, a glorious fancy, a rattle to still men's ambition; and that as the passenger looketh no longer upon the dial than the sun shineth upon it, so it is here. ( J. Trapp. ) For he saw that there was evil determined against him by the king. Esteem changed to hatred T. McEwan. How easily does he appear to have taken off his regards from his favourite! There was nothing lasting in the bond which united them. The esteem of yesterday was changed into hatred to-day. All their convivial meetings and merry-making, when the city of Shushan was perplexed, were forgotten, and the man's destruction was determined upon with as much zest and zeal as his elevation had been promoted. Such is largely the characteristic of the friendship of worldly men. Close and ardent for a time, but liable at any moment to be turned into enmity. How different from the tie which ought to bind together Christian hearts in the common love of the same Saviour. ( T. McEwan. ) Unexpected peril T. McEwan. The wicked know not the moment that the mine is to be sprung under their feet. ( T. McEwan. ) Will he force the queen also before me in Suspicions T. McCrie, D. D. It is the misery of those who have been detected in the commission of great crimes, and it is a just part of their punishment, to be suspected or accused of that of which they were guiltless. But yesterday, all that Haman said or did was viewed with a favourable aye; now, the most innocent actions are construed to his disadvantage. ( T. McCrie, D. D. ) And Harbonah, one of the king's chamber-laths, said before the king, Behold also, the gallows fifty cubits high. The falling man W. M. Taylor, D. D. When a great man is going down, the meanest will give him a push. ( W. M. Taylor, D. D. ) Fickle courtier A. M. Symington, B. A. s: — Courtiers are very clever persons, and turn with wonderful agility. ( A. M. Symington, B. A. ) Reverses W. A. Scott, D. D. But how terrible are the reverses of princes, and how sudden the fall of statesmen. Wolsey, Raleigh, Essex and Louis Phillippe, are only a few out of many that illustrate how slippery are the steps of thrones and the standings around them. ( W. A. Scott, D. D. ) So they hanged Haman on the gallows that he had prepared for Mordecai Moral retribution W. M. Taylor, D. D. We all remember the ballad of Southey which tells how Sir Ralph the Rover, who cut away Inch Cape Bell, perished with all his crew upon the Inch Cape Rock; and even secular historians have been constrained to remark on illustrations of the fulfilment of this law of providence. Thus Macaulay reminds us that no man ever made a more unscrupulous use of the legislative power for the destruction of his enemies than Thomas Cromwell, and that it was by the unscrupulous use of the legislative power that he was himself destroyed. And Alison recognises in the death of Murat a memorable instance of the "moral retribution which often attends upon great deeds of iniquity, and by the instrumentality of the very acts that appeared to place them beyond its reach." He underwent, in 1815, the very fate to which, seven years before, he had consigned a hundred Spaniards of Madrid, guilty of no other crime than of defending their country, and this, as the historian adds, "by the application of a law to his own case which he himself had introduced to check the attempts of the Bourbons to regain a throne which he had usurped." Thus, often, in the words of the great dramatist, the engineer is "hoist with his own petard"; and we see that even in this life there is retribution. But it may be said that, though this is observable in great matters and with great people, it is not found in small. And to that I reply that there is nothing small in the providence of God. But others may say that this law is not absolutely universal, and that there have been cases in which it has not been fulfilled. To that I reply that there are such anomalies in God's providence on earth, but the existence of these is only a reason for our believing that the retribution which has not overtaken the sinner here will surely come upon him hereafter; for then God "shall render to every man according to his works." ( W. M. Taylor, D. D. ) Haman confounded W. A. Scott, D. D. 1. Oh, how great are the vicissitudes of life! When Haman thought himself secure, then he was nearest to his ruin. 2. How sudden and astonishing the change that takes place in the feelings of those about the court. Yesterday, everybody envied Haman for his prosperity, but hated him for his insolence. Yesterday, they bowed the knee, and did him homage, but now that they see he has fallen, they are just as hearty in their rejoicings at his downfall. If Haman be going down, they all cry, "Down with him!" And as Mordecai is now the favourite, all are ready to exalt him. The old Louis, dead in Versailles, may rot or bury himself, while the courtier and countesses are making fair weather with the rising sun. 3. Haman pleading at Esther's feet is a proof that "the heathen are sent down in the pit that they made: in the net which they hid is their own foot taken." The Jews' enemy, and the adversary of the Hebrew orphan, a suppliant at the queen's feet, illustrates how God regarded the low estate of his handmaiden, and scattered the proud in their imagination. 4. Another lesson learned from Haman's gallows, perhaps, better than from any other standpoint of this history, is to beware of the first risings of evil passions. 5. We see again that human prosperity is wholly unavailing in the hour of calamity. The glory of Haman yesterday only enhances his disgrace to-day. 6. It is then an unfair, limited, and partial view of providence to say that God's favours are not wisely and equitably distributed among men. The purposes of God are not to be judged of by the events of a moment, nor by the occurrences that are near together. The chain of providence has many links; some are so high, and some are so far away, that at present we cannot see them, nor can we judge correctly of it till we see the whole chain together. 7. You must learn to discriminate between real and apparent happiness. ( W. A. Scott, D. D. ) A warning to ambitious men J. Parker, D. D. Let all ambitious men read the story of Haman and take warning. Hie story may not be repeated in all its Oriental details; yet there remains enough in the tale to remind us that we too are ambitious, that we too may have ignoble thoughts towards our fellow-men, and that even we are not above resor

Benson Commentary Esther 7:1 So the king and Haman came to banquet with Esther the queen. Esther 7:2 And the king said again unto Esther on the second day at the banquet of wine, What is thy petition, queen Esther? and it shall be granted thee: and what is thy request? and it shall be performed, even to the half of the kingdom. Esther 7:2 . The king said again to Esther, What is thy petition, Queen Esther? &c. — If the king had now forgot that Esther had an errand to him, and had not again asked what it was, she could scarce have known how to renew it herself; but he was mindful of it, and now was bound with the three-fold cord of a promise, thrice made, to favour her. Esther 7:3 Then Esther the queen answered and said, If I have found favour in thy sight, O king, and if it please the king, let my life be given me at my petition, and my people at my request: Esther 7:3 . Then Esther the queen answered and said, &c. — Esther, at length, surprises the king with a petition, not for wealth, or honour, or the preferment of some of her friends to some high post, which the king expected, but for the preservation of herself and her countrymen from death and destruction. O king, let my life be given me at my petition — It is my humble and only request, that thou wouldst not give me up to the malice of that man that designs to take away my life, and will certainly do it, if thou do not prevent it. And my people — That is, the lives of my people, of the Jews, of whom I am descended. Even a stranger, a criminal, shall be permitted to petition for his life. But that a friend, a wife, a queen, should have occasion to make such a request, was very affecting! Esther 7:4 For we are sold, I and my people, to be destroyed, to be slain, and to perish. But if we had been sold for bondmen and bondwomen, I had held my tongue, although the enemy could not countervail the king's damage. Esther 7:4 . For we are sold, I and my people, to be destroyed, &c. — By the cruelty of that man, who offered a great sum to purchase our destruction. We have not forfeited our lives by any offence against the government, but are sold to gratify the pride and revenge of one man. If we had been sold for bond-men and bond-women — Sold merely into slavery; I had held my tongue — I would not have complained, for in time we might have been ransomed and delivered. But it is not our liberty only, but our lives that are sold. Although the enemy could not countervail the king’s damage — His ten thousand talents would not repair the king’s loss in the customs and tributes, which the king receives from the Jews within his dominions, nor the injury his kingdom would sustain, by the loss of so many industrious hands out of it. To persecute good people is as impolitic as it is impious, and a manifest wrong to the interests of princes and states, which are weakened and empoverished by it. Esther 7:5 Then the king Ahasuerus answered and said unto Esther the queen, Who is he, and where is he, that durst presume in his heart to do so? Esther 7:5 . Then the king said, Who is he, and where is he, that durst presume in his heart to do so? — What! contrive the murder of the queen and all her friends? Is there such a man, or such a monster, rather, in nature? The expressions are short and doubled, as proceeding from a discomposed and enraged mind. The Hebrew is, Whose heart has filled him, as in the margin; or, Who hath filled his heart, to do so? He wonders that any one should be so wicked as to conceive such a thing, or that any one should be so bold as to attempt to effect it; that is, to circumvent him, and procure a decree, whereby not only his revenue should be so much injured, and so many of his innocent subjects destroyed, but his queen also involved in the same destruction. We sometimes startle at that evil which we ourselves are chargeable with. Ahasuerus is amazed at that wickedness which he himself was guilty of: for he had consented to the bloody edict; so that Esther might have said, Thou art the man! Esther 7:6 And Esther said, The adversary and enemy is this wicked Haman. Then Haman was afraid before the king and the queen. Esther 7:6 . Esther said, The enemy is this wicked Haman — It is he that has designed our murder, and I charge him with it before his face: here he is; let him speak for himself, for therefore he was invited. Then Haman was afraid before the king and the queen — It was time for him to fear, when the queen was his prosecutor, the king his judge, and his own conscience a witness against him; and the surprising operations of providence against him that same morning could not but increase his fear. Now he has little joy of his being invited to the banquet of wine, but finds himself in straits when he thought himself in the fulness of his sufficiency. Esther 7:7 And the king arising from the banquet of wine in his wrath went into the palace garden: and Haman stood up to make request for his life to Esther the queen; for he saw that there was evil determined against him by the king. Esther 7:7 . And the king arising from the banquet in his wrath — As disdaining the company and sight of so ungrateful and audacious a person; went into the palace-garden — To cool and allay his troubled and inflamed spirits, being in a great commotion by a variety of passions boiling and struggling within him; and to consider with himself the heinousness of Haman’s crime, the mischief which himself had like to have done by his own rashness, and what punishment was fit to be inflicted on so vile a miscreant. Haman stood up to make request for his life to Esther — He first stood up, and then fell down at her feet, to beg she would save his life, and take all he had. They that are most haughty, insolent, and imperious, when they are in power and prosperity, are commonly the most abject and poor-spirited, on a reverse of condition and circumstances. Esther’s sworn enemy now owns that he lies at her mercy, and begs his life at her hand. Thus did God regard the low estate of his handmaiden. For he saw that there was evil determined against him — This he discerned by the violent commotion of the king’s mind, apparent in his countenance, and by his going out of the room in a great rage. Esther 7:8 Then the king returned out of the palace garden into the place of the banquet of wine; and Haman was fallen upon the bed whereon Esther was . Then said the king, Will he force the queen also before me in the house? As the word went out of the king's mouth, they covered Haman's face. Esther 7:8 . Then the king returned out of the palace garden — Yet more exasperated than when he went into it. The more he thought of Haman’s conduct, the more enraged he was against him. Haman was fallen upon the bed whereon Esther was — Or by, or beside the bed, on which the queen sat at meat, after the manner of those times and countries. For it was then a custom among the Persians, as well as many other nations, to sit, or rather lie, upon beds, when they ate or drank. And Haman, it seems, fell down as a supplicant at the feet of Esther, laying his hands upon her knees, and beseeching her to take pity upon him: for it is not improbable that it was the custom among the Persians, as it was among the Greeks and Romans, to embrace the knees of those whom they petitioned to be favourable to them. Then said the king — Finding him in this posture; Will he force the queen also before me in the house? — Will he attempt my queen’s chastity, as he hath already attempted her life, and that in my own presence and palace? His presumption and impudence, I see, will stick at nothing. He speaks not this out of real jealousy, for which there was no cause in those circumstances; but from an exasperated mind, which takes all occasions to vent itself against the person who gave the provocation, and puts the worst construction on all his words and actions. They covered Haman’s face — That the king might not be offended or grieved at the sight of a person whom he now detested; and because they looked upon him as a condemned person, for the faces of such used to be covered. Esther 7:9 And Harbonah, one of the chamberlains, said before the king, Behold also, the gallows fifty cubits high, which Haman had made for Mordecai, who had spoken good for the king, standeth in the house of Haman. Then the king said, Hang him thereon. Esther 7:9 . And Harbonah said — The courtiers that adored Haman when he was rising, set themselves as much against him now he is falling, and are glad of an opportunity to sink him lower: so little sure can proud men be of the interest they think they have in others. Behold also the gallows, &c., standeth in the house of Haman — He had probably observed it, or been informed of it by some of his brethren, who were lately sent to Haman’s house: and this he said, either out of a dislike he had taken to Haman, for his great insolence and barbarous cruelty, or in compliance with the king and queen’s inclinations. Which Haman had made for Mordecai, who had spoken good for the king — And, therefore, deserved a better requital than this, even from Haman, if he had not basely preferred the satisfaction of his own revenge before the king’s life. Now Mordecai is the favourite, and Haman being in disgrace, every thing is taken notice of that was to his disadvantage, or that might incense the king more against him. Then the king said, Hang him thereon — He takes no time to deliberate, but instantly passes sentence, without so much as asking Haman what he had to say in his own defence, or to offer why this judgment should not be passed upon him, and execution awarded. Esther 7:10 So they hanged Haman on the gallows that he had prepared for Mordecai. Then was the king's wrath pacified. Esther 7:10 . So they hanged Haman on the gallows that he had prepared for Mordecai — As the sentence was short, so the execution was speedy, and he that expected every one to do him reverence is now made an ignominious spectacle to the world on a gallows fifty cubits high: and himself is sacrificed to justice, who disdained that less than a whole nation should be sacrificed to his revenge. Thus does God resist the proud, and those whom he resists will find him irresistible! Thus did mischief return on the person that contrived it, and the wicked was snared in the work of his own hands. If he had not set up that gallows, the king probably would not have thought of ordering him to be hanged; but as he had unjustly prepared it for a good man, he was justly condemned to suffer on it himself. The enemies of God’s church have often been thus taken in their own craftiness. In the morning, Haman designed himself for the robes, and Mordecai for the gallows: but the tables are now turned, and Mordecai has the crown and Haman the cross. The Lord is known by the judgments which he executeth. “I cannot pass over this wonderful harmony of providence,” says Josephus, ( Antiq., 50:2, c. 6,) “without a remark upon the almighty power, and admirable justice of the wisdom of God; not only in bringing Haman to his deserved punishment, but in trapping him in the very snare which he had laid for another, and turning a malicious invention upon the head of the inventor.” Bishop Patrick observes, on this wonderful deliverance of the Jewish nation, that “though, in the whole, there was no extraordinary manifestation of God’s power; no particular cause, or agent, which was in its working advanced above the ordinary pitch of nature; yet the contrivance, and suiting these ordinary agents appointed by God, is in itself more admirable than if the same end had been effected by means which were truly miraculous. That a king should not sleep, is no unusual thing, nor that he should solace his waking thoughts by hearing the annals of his own kingdom, or the journals of his own reign, read to him: but that he should be awake at that time, especially when Haman was watching to destroy the Jews, and that, in the chronicles of the kingdom, they should light on that place where Mordecai’s unrewarded services were recorded; that the king should resolve, thereupon, forthwith to do him honour; that Haman should come in at the very moment when he was so disposed; should ignorantly determine what honour should be done him, and be himself appointed to that ungrateful office: all this, no doubt, was from the Keeper of Israel, who neither slumbereth nor sleepeth, and was truly marvellous in his people’s eyes.” — See Dodd. Benson Commentary on the Old and New Testaments Text Courtesy of BibleSupport.com . Used by Permission.

Expositor's Bible Commentary Esther 7:1 So the king and Haman came to banquet with Esther the queen. QUEEN ESTHER Esther 4:1-5 ; Esther 7:1-4 ; Esther 9:12-13 THE young Jewess who wins the admiration of the Persian king above all the chosen maidens of his realm, and who then delivers her people in the crisis of supreme danger at the risk of her own life, is the central figure in the story of the origin of Purim. It was a just perception of the situation that led to the choice of her name as the title of the book that records her famous achievements, Esther first appears as an obscure orphan who has been brought up in the humble home of her cousin Mordecai. After her guardian has secured her admission to the royal harem-a doubtful honour we might think, but a very real honour in the eyes of an ancient Oriental-she receives a year’s training with the use of the fragrant unguents that are esteemed so highly in a voluptuous Eastern court. We should not expect to see anything better than the charms of physical beauty after such a process of development, charms not of the highest type-languid, luscious, sensuous. The new name bestowed on this finished product of the chief art cultivated in the palace of Ahasuerus points to nothing higher, for "Esther" ( Istar ) is the name of a Babylonian goddess equivalent to the Greek "Aphrodite." And yet our Esther is a heroine-capable, energetic, brave, and patriotic. The splendour of her career is seen in this very fact, that she does not succumb to the luxury of her surroundings. The royal harem among the lily-beds of Shushan is like a palace in the land of the lotus-eaters, "where it is always afternoon," and its inmates, in their dreamy indolence, are tempted to forget all obligations and interests beyond the obligation to please the king and their own interest in securing every comfort wealth can lavish on them. We do not look for a Boadicea in such a hot-house of narcotics. And when we find there a strong, unselfish woman such as Esther, conquering almost insuperable temptations to a life of ease, and choosing a course of terrible danger to herself for the sake of her oppressed people, we can echo the admiration of the Jews for their national heroine. It is a woman, then, who plays the leading part in this drama of Jewish history. From Eve to Mary, women have repeatedly appeared in the most prominent places on the pages of Scripture. The history of Israel finds some of its most powerful situations in the exploits of Deborah, Jael, and Judith. On the side of evil, Delilah, Athaliah, and Jezebel are not less conspicuous. There was a freedom enjoyed by the women of Israel that was not allowed in the more elaborate civilisation of the great empires of the East, and this developed an independent spirit and a vigour not usually seen in Oriental women. In the case of Esther these good qualities were able to survive the external restraints and the internal relaxing atmosphere of her court life. The scene of her story is laid in the harem. The plots and intrigues of the harem furnish its principal incidents. Yet if Esther had been a shepherdess from the mountains of Judah, she could not have proved herself more energetic. But her court life had taught her skill in diplomacy, for she had to pick her way among the greatest dangers like a person walking among concealed knives. The beauty of Esther’s character is this, that she is not spoiled by her great elevation. To be the one favourite out of all the select maidens of the kingdom, and to know that she owes her privileged position solely to the king’s fancy for her personal charms, might have spoilt the grace of a simple Jewess. Haman, we saw, was ruined by his honours becoming too great for his self control. But in Esther we do not light on a trace of the silly vanity that became the most marked characteristic of the grand vizier. It speaks well for Mordecai’s sound training of the orphan girl that his ward proved to be of stable character where a weaker person would have been dizzy with selfish elation. The unchanged simplicity of Esther’s character’ is first apparent in her submissive obedience to her guardian even after her high position has been attained. Though she is treated as his Queen by the Great King, she does not forget the kind porter who has brought her up from childhood. In the old days she had been accustomed to obey this grave Jew, and she has no idea of throwing off the yoke now that he has no longer any recognised power over her. The habit of obedience persists in her after the necessity for it has been removed. This would no have been so remarkable if Esther had been weak-minded woman, readily subdued and kept in subjection by a masterful will. But her energy and courage at a momentous crisis entirely forbid any such estimate of her character. It must have been genuine humility and unselfishness that prevented her from rebelling against the old home authority when a heavy injunction was laid upon her. She undertakes the dangerous part of the champion of a threatened race solely at the instance of Mordecai. He urges the duty upon her, and she accepts it meekly. She is no rough Amazon. With all her greatness and power, she is still a simple, unassuming woman. But when Esther has assented to the demands of Mordecai, she appears in her people’s cause with the spirit of true patriotism. She scorns to forget her humble origin in all the splendour of her later advancement. She will own her despised and hated people before the king, she will plead the cause of the oppressed, though at the risk of her life. She is aware of the danger of her undertaking, but she says, "If I perish. I perish." The habit of obedience could not have been strong enough to carry her through the terrible ordeal if Mordecai’s hard requirement had not been seconded by the voice of her own conscience. She knows that it is right that she should undertake this difficult and dangerous work. How naturally might she have shrunk back with regret for the seclusion and obscurity of the old days when her safety lay in her insignificance? But she saw that her new privileges involved new responsibilities. A royal harem is the last place in which we should look for the recognition of this truth. Esther is to be honoured because even in that palace of idle luxury she could acknowledge the stern obligation that so many in her position would never have glanced at. It is always difficult to perceive and act on the responsibility that certainly accompanies favour and power. This difficulty is one reason why "it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God." For while unusual prosperity brings unusual responsibility, simply because it affords unusual opportunities for doing good, it tends to cultivate pride and selfishness, and the miserable worldly spirit that is fatal to all high endeavour and all real sacrifice. Our Lord’s great principle, "Unto whom much is given, of him shall much be required," is clear as a mathematical axiom when we look at it in the abstract, but nothing is harder than for people to apply it to their own cases. If it were freely admitted, the ambition that grasps at the first places would be shamed into silence. If it were generally acted on, the wide social cleft between the fortunate and the miserable would be speedily bridged over. The total ignoring, of this tremendous principle by the great majority of those who enjoy the privileged positions in society is undoubtedly one of the chief causes of the ominous unrest that is growing more and more disturbing in the less favoured ranks of life. If this supercilious contempt for an imperative duty continues, what can be the end but an awful retribution? Was it not the wilful blindness of the dancers in the Tuileries to the misery of the serfs on the fields that caused revolutionary France to run red with blood? Esther was wise in taking the suggestion of her cousin that she had been raised up for the very purpose of saving her people. Here was a faith, reserved and reticent, but real and powerful. It was no idle chance that had tossed her on the crest of the wave while so many of her sisters were weltering in the dark floods beneath. A clear, high purpose was leading her on to a strange and mighty destiny, and now the destiny was appearing, sublime and terrible, like some awful mountain peak that must be climbed unless the soul that has come thus far will turn traitor and fall back into failure and ignominy. When Esther saw this, she acted on it with the promptitude of the founder of her nation, who esteemed "the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures of Egypt," but with this difference, that, while Moses renounced his high rank in Pharaoh’s court in order to identify himself with his people, the Queen of Ahasuerus retained her perilous position and turned it to good account in her saving mission. Thus there are two ways in which an exalted person may serve others. He may come down from his high estate like Moses, like Christ who was rich and for our sakes became poor, or he may take advantage of his privileged position to use it for the good of his brethren, regarding it as a trust to be held for those whom he can benefit, like Joseph, who was able in this way to save his father and his brothers from famine, and like Esther in the present case. Circumstances will guide the willing to a decision as to which of these courses should be chosen. We must not turn from this subject without remembering that Mordecai plied Esther with other considerations besides the thought of her mysterious destiny. He warned her that she should not escape if she disowned her people. He expressed his confidence that if she shrank from her high mission deliverance would "come from another place," to her eternal shame. Duty is difficult, and there is often a call for the comparatively lower, because more selfish, considerations that urge to it. The reluctant horse requires the spur. And yet the noble courage of Esther could not have come chiefly from fear or any other selfish motive. It must have been a sense of her high duty and wonderful destiny that inspired her. There is no inspiration like that of the belief that we are called to a great mission. This is the secret of the fanatical heroism of the Madhist dervishes. In a more holy warfare it makes heroes of the weakest. Having once accepted her dreadful task, Esther proceeded to carry it out with courage. It was a daring act for her to enter the presence of the king unsummoned. Who could tell but that the fickle monarch might take offence at the presumption of his new favourite, as he had done in the case of her predecessor? Her lonely position might have made the strongest of women quail as she stepped forth from her seclusion and ventured to approach her lord. Her motive might be shamefully misconstrued by the low-minded monarch. Would the king hold out the golden sceptre to her? The chances of life and death hung on the answer to that question. Nehemiah, though a courageous man and a favourite of his royal master, was filled with apprehension at the prospect of a far less dangerous interview with a much more reasonable ruler than the half-mad Xerxes. These Oriental autocrats were shrouded in the terror of divinities. Their absolute power left the lives of all who approached them at the mercy of their caprice. Ahasuerus had just sanctioned a senseless, bloodthirsty decree. Very possibly he had murdered Vashti, and that on the offence of a moment. Esther was in favour, but she belonged to the doomed people, and she was committing an illegal action deliberately in the face of the king. She was Fatima risking the wrath of Bluebeard. We know how Nehemiah would have acted at this trying moment. He would have strengthened his heart with one of those sudden ejaculations of prayer that were always ready to spring to his lips on any emergency. It is not in accordance with the secular tone of the story of Esther’s great undertaking that any hint of such an action on her part should have been given. Therefore we cannot say that she was a woman of no religion, that she was prayerless, that she launched on this great enterprise entirely relying on her own strength. We must distinguish between reserve and coldness in regard to religion. The fire burns while the heart muses. even though the lips are still. At all events, if it is the intention of the writer to teach that Esther was mysteriously raised up for the purpose of saving her people, it is a natural inference to conclude that she was supported in the execution of it by unseen and silent aid. Her name does not appear in the honour roll of Hebrews 11:1-40 . We cannot assert that she acted in the strength of faith. And yet there is more evidence of faith, even though it is not professed, in conduct that is true and loyal, brave and unselfish, than we can find in the loudest profession of a creed without the confirmation of corresponding conduct. "I will show my faith by my works," says St. James, and he may show it without once naming it. It is to be noted, further, that Esther was a woman of resources. She did not trust to her courage alone to secure her end. It was not enough that she owned her people, and was willing to plead their cause. She had the definite purpose of saving them to effect. She was not content to be a martyr to patriotism; a sensible, practical woman, she did her utmost to be successful in effecting the deliverance of the threatened Jews. With this end in view, it was necessary for her to proceed warily. Her first step was gained when she had secured an audience with the king. We may surmise that her beautiful countenance was lit up with a new, rare radiance when all self-seeking was banished from her mind and an intense, noble aim fired her soul, and thus, it may be, her very loftiness of purpose helped to secure its success. Beauty is a gift, a talent, to be used for good, like any other Divine endowment; the highest beauty is the splendour of soul that sometimes irradiates the most commonplace countenance, so that, like Stephen’s, it shines as the face of an angel. Instead of degrading her beauty with foolish vanity, Esther consecrated it to a noble service, and thereby it was glorified. This one talent was not lodged with her useless. The first point was gained in securing the favour of Ahasuerus. But all was not yet won. It would have been most unwise for Esther to have burst out with her daring plea for the condemned people in the moment of the king’s surprised welcome. But she was patient and skilful in managing her delicate business. She knew the king’s weakness for good living, and she played upon it for her great purpose. Even when she had got him to a first banquet, she did not venture to bring out her request. Perhaps her courage failed her at the last moment. Perhaps, like a keen, observant woman, she perceived that she had not yet wheedled the king round to the condition in which it would be safe to approach the dangerous topic. So she postponed her attempt to another day and a second banquet. Then she seized her opportunity. With great tact, she began by pleading for her own life. Her piteous entreaty amazed the dense-minded monarch. At the same time the anger of his pride was roused. Who would dare to touch his favourite queen? It was a well-chosen moment to bring such a notion into the mind of a king who was changeable as a child. We may be sure that Esther had been doing her very best to please him throughout the two banquets. Then she had Haman on the spot. He, too, prime minister of Persia as he was, had to find that for once in his life he had been outwitted by a woman. Esther meant to strike while the iron was hot. So the arch-enemy of her people was there, that the king might carry out the orders to which she was skilfully leading him on without the delay which would give the party of Haman an opportunity to turn him the other way. Haman saw it all in a moment. He confessed that the queen was mistress of the situation by appealing to her for mercy, in the frenzy of his terror even so far forgetting his place as to fling himself on her couch. That only aggravated the rage of the jealous king. Haman’s fate was sealed on the spot., Esther was completely triumphant. After this it is painful to see how the woman who had saved her people at the risk of her own life pushed her advantage to the extremity of a bloodthirsty vengeance. It is all very well to say that, as the laws of the Medes and Persians could not be altered, there was no alternative but a defensive slaughter. We may try to shelter Esther under the customs of the times; we may call to mind the fact that she was acting on the advice of Mordecai, whom she had been taught to obey from childhood, so that his was by far the greater weight of responsibility. Still, as we gaze on the portrait of the strong, brave, unselfish Jewess, we must confess that beneath all the beauty and nobility of its expression certain hard lines betray the fact that Esther is not a Madonna, that the heroine of the Jews does not reach the Christian ideal of womanhood. Esther 7:5 Then the king Ahasuerus answered and said unto Esther the queen, Who is he, and where is he, that durst presume in his heart to do so? HAMAN Esther 3:1-6 ; Esther 5:9-14 ; Esther 7:5-10 HAMAN is the Judas of Israel. Not that his conduct or his place in history would bring him into comparison with the traitor apostle, for he was an open foe and a foreigner. But he is treated by popular Judaism as the Arch-Enemy, just as Judas is treated by popular Christianity. Like Judas, he has assigned to him a solitary pre-eminence in wickedness, which is almost inhuman. As in the case of Judas, there is thought to be no call for charity or mercy in judging Haman. He shares with Judas the curse of Cain. Boundless execration is heaped on his head. Horror and hatred have almost transformed him into Satan. He is called "The Agagite," an obscure title which is best explained as a later Jewish nickname derived from a reference to the king of Amalek who was hewn in pieces before the Lord. In the Septuagint he is surnamed "The Macedonian," because when that version was made the enemies of Israel were the representatives of the empire of Alexander and his successors. During the dramatic reading of the Book of Esther in a Jewish synagogue at the Feast of Purim, the congregation may be found taking the part of a chorus and exclaiming at every mention of the name of Haman, "May his name be blotted out," "Let the name of the ungodly perish," while boys with mallets will pound stones and bits of wood on which the odious name is written. This frantic extravagance would be unaccountable but for the fact that the people whose "badge is sufferance" has summed up under the name of the Persian official the malignity of their enemies in all ages. Very often this name has served to veil a dangerous reference to some contemporary foe, or to heighten the rage felt against an exceptionally, odious person by its accumulation of traditional hatred, just as in England on the fifth of November the "Guy" may represent some unpopular person of the day. When we turn from this unamiable indulgence of spiteful passion to the story that lies behind it, we have enough that is odious without the conception of a sheer monster of wickedness, a very demon. Such a being would stand outside the range of human motives, and we could contemplate him with unconcern and detachment of mind, just as we contemplate the destructive forces of nature. There is a common temptation to clear ourselves of all semblance to the guilt of very bad people by making it out to be inhuman. It is more humiliating to discover that they act from quite human motives-nay, that those very motives may be detected, though with other bearings, even in our own conduct. For see what were the influences that stirred in the heart of Haman. He manifests by his behaviour the intimate connection between vanity and cruelty. The first trait in his character to reveal itself is vanity, a most inordinate vanity. Haman is introduced at the moment when he has been exalted to the highest position under the king of Persia; he has just been made grand vizier. The tremendous honour turns his brain. In the consciousness of it he swells out with vanity. As a necessary consequence he is bitterly chagrined when a porter does not do homage to him as to the king. His elation is equally extravagant when he discovers that he is to be the only subject invited to meet Ahasuerus at Esther’s banquet. When the king inquires how exceptional honour is to be shown to some one whose name is not yet revealed, this infatuated man jumps to the conclusion that it can be for nobody but himself. In all his behaviour we see that he is just possessed by an absorbing spirit of vanity. Then at the first check he suffers an annoyance proportionate to the boundlessness of his previous elation. He cannot endure the sight of indifference or independence in the meanest subject. The slender fault of Mordecai is magnified into a capital offence. This again is so huge that it must be laid to the charge of the whole race to which the offender belongs. The rage which it excites in Haman is so violent that it will be satisfied with nothing short of a wholesale massacre of men, women, and children. "Behold how great a matter a little fire kindleth"-when it is fanned by the breath of vanity. The cruelty of the vain man is as limitless as his vanity. Thus the story of Haman illustrates the close juxtaposition of these two vices, vanity and cruelty; it helps us to see by a series of lurid pictures how fearfully provocative the one is of the other. As we follow the incidents, we can discover the links of connection between the cause and its dire effects. In the first place, it is clear that vanity is a form of magnified egotism. The vain man thinks supremely of himself, not so much in the way of self-interest, but more especially for the sake of self-glorification. When he looks out on the world, it is always through the medium of his own vastly magnified shadow. Like the Brocken Ghost, this shadow becomes a haunting presence standing out before him in huge proportions. He has no other standard of measurement. Everything must be judged according, as it is related to himself. The good is what gives him pleasure; evil is what is noxious to him. This self-centred attitude, with the distortion of vision that it induces, has a double effect, as we may see in the case of Haman. Egotism utilises the sufferings of others for its own ends. No doubt cruelty is often a consequence of sheer callousness. The man who has no perception of the pain he is causing or no sympathy with the sufferers will trample them under foot on the least provocation. He feels supremely indifferent to their agonies when they are writhing beneath him, and therefore he will never consider it incumbent on him to adjust his conduct with the least reference to the pain he gives. That is an entirely irrelevant consideration. The least inconvenience to himself outweighs the greatest distress of other people, for the simple reason that that distress counts as nothing in his calculation of motives. In Haman’s case, however, we do not meet with this attitude of simple indifference. The grand vizier is irritated, and he vents his annoyance in a vast explosion of malignity that must take account of the agony it produces, for in that agony its own thirst for vengeance is to be slaked. But this only shows the predominant selfishness to be all the greater. It is so great that it reverses the engines that drive society along the line of mutual helpfulness, and thwarts and frustrates any amount of human life and happiness for the sole purpose of gratifying its own desires. Then the selfishness of vanity promotes cruelty still further by another of its effects. It destroys the sense of proportion. Self is not only regarded as the centre of the universe; like the sun surrounded by the planets, it is taken to be the greatest object, and everything else is insignificant when compared to it. What is the slaughter of a few thousand Jews to so great a man as Haman, grand vizier of Persia? It is no more than the destruction of as many flies in a forest fire that the settler has kindled to clear his ground. The same self-magnification is visibly presented by the Egyptian bas-reliefs, on which the victorious Pharaohs appear as tremendous giants driving back hordes of enemies or dragging pigmy kings by their heads. It is but a step from this condition to insanity, which is the apotheosis of vanity. The chief characteristic of insanity is a diseased enlargement of self. If he is elated the madman regards himself as a person of supreme importance-as a prince, as a king, even as God. If he is depressed he thinks that he is the victim of exceptional malignity. In that case he is beset by watchers of evil intent, the world is conspiring against him, everything that happens is part of a plot to do him harm. Hence his suspiciousness, hence his homicidal proclivities. He is not so mad in his inferences and conclusions. These may be rational and just, on the ground of his premisses. It is in the fixed ideas of these premisses that the root of his insanity may be detected. His awful fate is a warning to all who venture to indulge in the vice of excessive egotism. In the second place, vanity leads to cruelty through the entire dependence of the vain person on the good opinion of others, and this we may see clearly in the career of Haman. Vanity is differentiated from pride in one important particular-by its outward reference. The proud man is satisfied with himself, hut the vain man is always looking outside himself with feverish eagerness to secure all the honours that the world can bestow upon him. Thus Mordecai may have been proud in his refusal to bow before the upstart premier, if so his pride would not need to court admiration; it would be self-contained and self-sufficient. But Haman was possessed by an insatiable thirst for homage. If a single obscure individual refused him this honour, a shadow rested on everything. He could not enjoy the queen’s banquet for the slight offered him by the Jew at the palace gate, so that he exclaimed, "Yet all this availeth me nothing, so long as I see Mordecai the Jew sitting at the king’s gate." { Esther 5:13 } A selfish man in this condition can have no rest if anything in the world outside him fails to minister to his honour. While a proud man in an exalted position scarcely deigns to notice the "dim common people," the vain man betrays his vulgarity by caring supremely for popular adulation. Therefore, while the haughty person can afford to pass over a slight with contempt, the vain creature who lives on the breath of applause is mortally offended by it and roused to avenge the insult with corresponding rage. Selfishness and dependence on the external, these attributes of vanity inevitably develop into cruelty wherever the aims of vanity are opposed. And yet the vice that contains so much evil is rarely visited with a becoming severity of condemnation. Usually it is smiled at as a trivial frailty. In the case of Haman it threatened the extermination of a nation, and the reaction from its menace issued in a terrific slaughter of another section of society. History records war after war that has been fought on the ground of vanity. In military affairs this vice wears the name of glory, but its nature is unaltered. For what is the meaning of a war that is waged for "l a gloire " but one that is designed in order to minister to the vanity of the people who undertake it? A more fearful wickedness has never blackened the pages of history. The very frivolity of the occasion heightens the guilt of those who plunge nations into misery on such a paltry pretext. It is vanity that urges a savage warrior to collect skulls to adorn the walls of his hut with the ghastly trophies, it is vanity that impels a restless conqueror to march to his own triumph through a sea of blood, it is vanity that rouses a nation to fling itself on its neighbour in order to exalt its fame by a great victory. Ambition at its best is fired by the pride of power, but in its meaner forms ambition is nothing but an uprising of vanity clamouring for wider recognition. The famous invasion of Greece by Xerxes was evidently little better than a huge exhibition of regal vanity. The childish fatuity of the king could seek for no exalted ends. His assemblage of swarms of men of all races in an ill-disciplined army too big for practical warfare showed that the thirst for display occupied the principal place in his mind, to the neglect of the more sober aims of a really great conqueror. And if the vanity that lives on the world’s admiration is so fruitful in evil when it is allowed to deploy on a large scale, its essential character will not be improved by the limitation of its scope in humbler spheres of life. It is always mean and cruel. Two other features in the character of Haman may be noticed. First, he shows energy and determination. He bribes the king to obtain the royal consent to his deadly design, bribes with an enormous present equal to the revenue of a kingdom, though Ahasuerus permits him to recoup himself by seizing the property of the proscribed nation. Then the murderous mandate goes forth, it is translated into every language of the subject peoples, it is carried to the remotest parts of the kingdom by the posts, the excellent organisation of which, under the Persian government, has become famous. Thus far everything is on a large scale, betokening a mind of resource and daring. But now turn to the sequel. "And the king and Haman sat down to drink." { Esther 3:15 } It is a horrible picture-the king of Persia and his grand vizier at this crisis deliberately abandoning themselves to their national vice. The decree is out, it cannot be recalled-let it go and do its fell work. As for its authors they are drowning all thought of its effect on public opinion in the wine-cup; they are boozing together in a disgusting companionship of debauchery on the eve of a scene of wholesale bloodshed. This is what the glory of the Great King has come to. This is the anticlimax of his minister’s vanity at the moment of supreme success. After such an exhibition we need not be surprised at the abject humiliation, the terror of cowardice, the frantic effort to extort pity from a woman of the very race whose extermination he had plotted, manifested by Haman in the hour of his exposure at Esther’s banquet. Beneath all his braggart energy he is a weak man. In most cases self-indulgent, vain, and cruel people are essentially weak at heart. Looking at the story of Haman from another point of view, we see how well it illustrates the confounding of evil devices and the punishment of their author in the drama of history. It is one of the most striking instances of what is called "poetic justice," the justice depicted by the poets, but not always seen in prosaic lives, the justice that is itself a poem because it makes a harmony of events. Haman is the typical example of the schemer who "falls into his own pit," of the villain who is "hoist on his own petard." Three times the same process occurs, to impress its lesson with threefold emphasis. We have it first in the most moderate form when Haman is forced to assist in bestowing on Mordecai the honours he has been coveting for himself, by leading the horse of the hated Jew in his triumphant procession through the city. The same lesson is impressed with tragic force when the grand vizier is condemned to be impaled on the stake erected by him in readiness for the man whom he has been compelled to honour. Lastly, the design of murdering the whole race to which Mordecai belongs is frustrated by the slaughter of those who sympathise with Haman’s attitude towards Israel-the "Hamanites," as they have been called. We rarely meet with such a complete reversal of fate, such a climax of vengeance. In considering the course of events here set forth we must distinguish between the old Jewish view of it and the significance of the process itself. The Jews were taught to look on all this with fierce, vindictive glee, and to see in it the prophecy of the like fate that was treasured up for their enemies in later times. This rage of the oppressed against their oppressors, this almost fiendish delight in the complete overthrow of the enemies of Israel, this total extinction of any sentiment of pity even for the helpless