The Book That God Wrote, Esther

Hey everybody, here I am back again, trying to stop this once a month madness, here to tell you all about the book of Esther. This is an important one to a lot of people, God I hope I don't disappoint all the Esther fans out there, though I probably will. Read on to find out how I'll disappoint you.

Who Wants to be the Queen of Persia:

Alright, so Esther ... Esther, Esther, Esther. What happens in Esther? Hm, well okay, like many of the best stories out there, this story starts with a party, woo. King Xerxes is throwing this huge party for all his buds. I'm not really sure how Xerxes, king of all Persia, partied back then, but I'm sure it had some of this going on.

That's right, we can finally talk about Xerxes, not that lame Artaxerxes, and I can throw out all these awesome 300 jokes at you and ... eh actually that's about it really, just implying that the movie exists. Yeah I know, I suck, anyway, moving on. This was actually a ridiculously long party, 180 days or so, according to the Bible, I mean damn, that's longer than if a dumb frat boy decided to party nonstop from the first day of the semester all the way through xmas break. And even dumb frat boys take breaks, fuckin props Xerxes, dude knows how to party, rock on. One wonders how Xerxes had any time to battle it out with Spartans ... man, maybe he was partying while battling Spartans, damn, props again son. Anyway, at this same exact time, Xerxes' wife Queen Vashti was having her own party with her girlfriends. What a great idea, and really, what wife would let their husband party 180 days straight? I mean, I see only two options, either they say "absolutely not!" like fucking always, or they say "fine whatever, but I'm gonna have my own party, with blackjack, and hookers." Wait, no, that's Bender, sorry.

Now at one point during this insanely long party Xerxes decides he wants Vashti to come by, so that she can pole dance for him and his friends or something. Well, Vashti gives him a big "Hell no, me and my girlfriends are having a ladies' 180 nights out, you and your scotch drinking, cigar smoking, douche friends can go on somewhere." Well needless to say Xerxes isn't happy about this, so he consults his advisers about what he should do, and he does this because apparently having Vashti go unpunished for publicly defying him would cause every other marriage in the country fall apart. I'm not shitting you, Xerxes actually logics his way through this, "Every other wife in the country will see that my wife talked back and got away with it, and then every other wife in the country will start talking back to their husbands and then every marriage will be in shambles and then all of Persia will collapse." Dude, how stoned are you right now? You say this as if talking back isn't already a woman's natural state response ... Oh God, I didn't just say that, please don't yell at me. Look I'll just say I'm sorry and we'll skip to the makeup sex, how does that sound? Oh ... okay, nevermind then.

For some reason I'm bad with the ladies, I can't imagine why. Anyway, one of Xerxes' advisers, named Simon Fuller I'm guessing, suggests that Vashti should be deposed as queen, and that they should find a new queen to replace her. "We'll have a contest," he says excitedly, gesticulating (I love that word), "called 'So You Want to be Queen of Persia?' Beautiful virgin girls across the country will audition, and the best ones will be chosen to be part of your harem, and from these girls you can choose your favorite to be your new queen. Trust me, it'll be a hit." Xerxes likes this idea, and yeah, honestly what hot blooded guy wouldn't? He's basically told that, "Hey we'll go out and find the prettiest girls we can, and then you can try them all out." And seriously, dude gets to try before he buys, and so he does until he finds Esther, and decides that she's hot enough to be queen of Persia.

Yes, this is who Esther is, the winning contestant on "Who Wants to be the Queen of Persia?" Here's the interesting thing, and what makes this story even worth telling, Esther is Jewish. She keeps this secret of course, for some reason, but yes, the queen of Persia is a Jew, only a few generations after being enslaved by the country. Also of import is her father Mordecai, in fact this book is almost as much about him as it is about Esther. Mordecai tells Esther to jump in on the Queen making beauty pageant, and gives her advice throughout the whole process ... which just seems completely creepy. No one wants their dad hanging around giving you beauty tips and sex advice. And on top of that, he basically spends all his time lurking around the palace when Esther is inside ... um ... "auditioning" for Xerxes ... and for no real reason either. It's not like anyone around knows that this creepy guy is Esther's father, he's just that scary loitering guy that everyone's too scared to tell to go away. Seriously, ladies, could you ever enjoy sex if you knew immediately afterwards you had to walk outside to your dad standing there with his arms crossed, creepily staring you down? Maybe I'm just the only one with daddy issues.

The Inhuman Haman:

Anyway, keeping this train wreck rolling, something good actually comes from all this creepering around. One day while making his rounds at the palace Mordecai overhears two guards plotting to assassinate Xerxes, and when he reports it he effectively stops a coup before it even got off the ground. Way to go creeperson. But not everything is all creeping around and saving kings for Mordecai, no, unfortunately there's some bad times coming. Right, so here's what happens, Xerxes appoints a new adviser named Haman, a douchy, self obsessed manipulative prick. So one day Haman walks out of the palace and notices Mordecai out there creeping it up, but more importantly he notices that Mordecai's not bowing down to him. Yeah, this is how prickish this guy was, everywhere he went he expected everyone to bow down to him, ugh. So he confronts Mordecai, "Why aren't you bowing down to me you filthy mudblood?"
"I only bow to God you self absorbed prick."

"We'll see," Haman sneers as he storms off.

The next day Haman goes to Xerxes, "My liege, it has come to my attention that there is a rebellious race within our country that would overthrow you if given the chance."
"Oh," Xerxes responds, "what do you suggest?"
"Give me your seal, I'll write a letter to all of the regional captains telling them in a month that all of these people should be killed, in say a months time?"
"Genocide eh? Sounds good to me, here's my seal."
Umm, what the fuck Xerxes? Why would you agree to something so fucked up without even asking who these people are? Hell you didn't look into it at all, are you that complacent that you'd agree to a mass murder without asking a simple question? Why in the world would you do this as a leader of a people? ... Oh, oh no.

At least Haman has a talking parrot.

So Haman takes the king's seal and writes a command to all the captains that in a month that all of the Jews in all of Persia will be brutally murdered. Wow, so I haven't really touched on yet about how much of an overreaction this is Haman. So the man didn't bow down to you, then cut off his finger, or torture him, or straight up kill him, or him in his family. Is there any reason why you have to murder his entire race? Shit dude, you have a talking parrot, surely you're happy without having to have every single person bow to you.

Anyway, this letter actually gets leaked to some of the public. Yes info used to leak before the internet existed, read a book, and all the Jews are completely upset (understatement of the year I know) and surprised. They begin mourning and crying, surely there's a person out there that can save them. The Jews need a savior.

I'm coming as fast as I can.

That savior, surprisingly, is Mordecai. Okay okay, those of you who're familiar with this book are probably screaming "No, Esther is the hero!" And to that I say: Stop screaming at your computer, it makes you look like a freak, and also, this is completely arguable, but, the way I see it, Mordecai is who gets the ball rolling on the salvation of the Jews, without him it might not have happened. We'll talk about this more later I promise. Anyway, Mordecai goes to the Palace and has Esther meet him at the gate.
"Esther, this is horrible, why didn't I hear this news from you? Why didn't you try to stop this?"
"Stop what daddy?"
"You mean you don't know? Your husband has ordered the death of all the Jews in Persia. What the fuck?! Seriously, what the fuck?!"
"Oh my god that's horrible."
"Esther, you have to get Xerxes to stop this, you have to go to him and make him change his mind. You were put in this position of power for this very reason, I just know it."
"Daddy, I can't, I haven't seen Xerxes in weeks, and if I go to him without being requested I'll be killed."
"Are you fucking kidding me? If you don't at least try then we all die, don't you understand that?"
"I ... okay fine, I'll try, and if I die then so be it."

So, what I don't get is why in the fuck Esther hadn't seen Xerxes in so long? Wasn't she the winner of the contest? Wouldn't Xerxes want to spend at least a good portion of his nights with her? Also, why would Esther be killed if she approached Xerxes without being invited? He was a dude right? Let me ask the straight dudes out there, would you ever be pissed if a beautiful girl walked in and sat next to you? Under normal circumstances I'd say hell no, and normal circumstances include the hot wife. And hey, guess what, this is exactly what happens when she shows up in the throne room out of nowhere. According to the Bible, "When he saw Queen Esther standing in the court, he was pleased with her and held out to her the gold scepter that was in his hand (5:2)." Ooh yeah, I bet he did. See Esther, nothing to it, the fellas can't resist when you dress up in your royal robes, always pointing their golden scepters at you, growwl.

"What can I do for you my beautiful queen?" Xerxes says, "What is your desire? Even if it is half the kingdom, it is yours."
"I wish to host a banquet for you and Haman," Esther says, "I shall make my request then."
"Very well," Xerxes says. And so Esther throws a little party with Xerxes and Haman, and once they're good and full, and probably drunk, Xerxes asks again, "What is your desire my dearest dear? Even if it's half of the country, it is yours."
"I wish to host another party for you and Haman tomorrow, I will make my request then."
"As you wish," Xerxes says.

Haman left this party in high spirits only to have his precious ego shattered to pieces when he saw Mordecai creeping around, and yet again not bowing to him. "Damn that Mordecai," Haman whines to his wife that night, "I'm so important to this country and to the king, I was the only one invited to dine with the king and queen tonight, and yet that damned Mordecai does not bow to me." Haman's now not content to wait an entire month for all of the Jews to be murdered, he decides to have a seventy foot high gallows built for the sole purpose of hanging Mordecai as soon as possible. Seriously, seventy feet high? Isn't that sort of overkill? That seems to be Haman's M.O. pure overkill.

This same night, Xerxes has trouble sleeping, he spends hours tossing and turning. Finally he gets up and starts reading the chronicles of his country, thinking that would be boring enough to put anyone to sleep. Typically he would be right, until he reads that Mordecai saved him from an assassination attempt about a month before. Wow, was this really the first time Xerxes heard about it? I guess the authorities thought it best not to worry the poor king with details of a botched assassination attempt. So, Xerxes asks his men, "How was Mordecai rewarded for saving my life?"
"Umm ... that creepy guy? Uh ... he wasn't my liege. We prefer not to talk to that guy."
"I can't believe this, you mean he wasn't even thanked? This wont do, not at all." And so he spends his morning pacing around the throne room thinking about how he can thank Mordecai. Now, this next part is probably my favorite part if Esther, seriously it's brilliant. See at this moment Haman comes cockily strolling in, and Xerxes asks, "Ah Haman, my adviser, what say you? What should be done for the man who pleases the king?" Well, this prick Haman thinks the king is talking about him, the self obsessed douche, so he responds thinking all this will be done to him.
"Oh, you should dress this man in the finest royal clothes, and put him on your finest horse and parade him around the city proclaiming how great he is. Yes, this is how you should reward the man that pleases you," Haman finishes with a smug grin. I'm surprised he didn't go as far as asking for a blowjob as a cherry on top.
"Excellent idea," Xerxes answers, "thank you Haman, I want you to do this for Mordecai right now, get to it."

Bet that knocked the smug grin right the fuck off his face. Ha, so there Haman was, leading the king's finest horse around the city, with the man sat atop it in the king's finest clothes, the man Haman hated more than anything, and he had to proclaim Mordecai's graces throughout. It's brilliant, thinking that he was explaining his own perfect reward, he was actually manufacturing his own greatest punishment. I imagine him trudging along in front of the horse, proclaiming Mordecai's brilliance through seething gritted teeth, every so often looking back with a death stare. "It's okay," Haman thinks after this humiliating ordeal is over, "this time tomorrow he'll be hanging seventy feet in the air from my noose." This thought cheers him up as he prepares for Esther's feast part two. Oh my is he in for a surprise.

That night at the feast, Xerxes asks Esther again, "What is your desire my dearest dear? Even if it's half of the country, it is yours." And finally she answers:

Grant me my life—this is my petition. And spare my people—this is my request. For I and my people have been sold for destruction and slaughter and annihilation. If we had merely been sold as male and female slaves, I would have kept quiet, because no such distress would justify disturbing the king. (7:3-4)

Oh well that's good to know, if we were just going to be slaves then eh, fuck it, not worth bothering you over, you've got Spartans to kill after all.
"Who is responsible for this outrage?" Xerxes roars, rising to his feat.
"The deplorable Haman!" Esther cries, pointing at Haman.
Xerxes screams and storms out of the room, leaving Esther and Haman behind. Haman gulps, he knows his fate, and he has only one chance to change it. He bows down at Esther's feet, "Have mercy my queen, I will do anything." How ironic, the man who was ready to commit genocide because a Jew would not bow to him is now bowing to the Jewish queen, begging for mercy. I fucking love this story, goddamn.

Um, then something weird happens, "Just as the king returned from the palace garden to the banquet hall, Haman was falling on the couch where Esther was reclining. The king exclaimed, 'Will he even molest the queen while she is with me in the house?' (7:8)." Um what? So okay, Haman was begging for his life, and then when Xerxes comes back Esther is lying on the couch and Haman collapses on top of her? What the fuck is happening here? Was he attacking her? Or maybe she seduced him to try to make his situation even worse? I really don't know, seems odd. Anyway, Xerxes has Haman hanged on his very own seventy foot gallows. How's that for a great ending? And on top of that Esther has Xerxes reverse Haman's ordinance against the Jews, and by "reverse" I mean he rewrites the law saying that the Jews can now legally kill any of their enemies if they want to. And kill them they do, the minute they hear of this law they bomb around and kill about 500 people. Yeah so that happened.

And that's basically Esther, it ends with Mordecai taking Haman's now empty position, driving the final nail into the asshole's punishment. It's quite a nice bit of poetic justice actually. Haman is hanged on his own gallows, his own people are murdered instead of the Jews, and the man he despises more than anything, gets the reward he wanted and then steals his job after he's dead. The moral of the story? Don't fuck with the Jews ... ever. God will fuck your shit up, but we've learned this before. But also, don't be an insufferable self obsessed douchebag, it's not attractive, and you'll end up hanging on your own gallows. Actually that's pretty good Zach, I'm impressed. Seriously though, there's quite a bit more I want to say about this book, but I'm well past my usual word limit, so I'll wrap it up for now, but be on the look out for a "What I Learned" coming soon (Next year probably, har har),. Until next time.