Speaker 1: Welcome to the commons cast. We're glad to have you here. We hope you find something meaningful in our teaching this week. Head to commons.church for more information.
Speaker 2: Hello, and welcome to church from wherever you are. So many people found Commons this last year of people we've never even met in person. This astounds us. And I wanna say a special thank you to you if you jumped into Commons pretty recently. Maybe you are here in Calgary and finally had the space to find a community more aligned with who you are.
Maybe you attend online from other cities and provinces and countries even. Maybe you are deeply committed to your local church, but you find something supplemental here with us. It's all so great. This is our world now, and it's an honor to be a part of what church is for you. If we have not met, I'm Bobbi.
And guess what? Next week is my birthday. I kinda love my birthday. I'll be can you guess? Give me a second.
I'll be 43. 1,000,000 points that don't mean anything if you got that right. Today, we continue the series My Queen, which is all about the Old Testament book of Esther. And I have to be honest with you. I have been a pastor for a long time and taught all ages in the church, but Esther is one of those books for which I've felt little to no personal connection in my history.
And that's okay. You can love the scriptures and not connect to everything. But this series has been so good for me and my low affinity with this book in the Bible. As I dig in, I move past the surface, and I love connecting with the rawness of this story. I've come to believe that the writer wrote Esther to help people process the trauma of their past and come to terms with the history that nearly wiped them out.
And provocatively, Esther is a story that uses comedy and whiplash reversal and wild exaggeration to talk about survival. And I don't know about you, but I love the way humor helps me process a hard time. Like, give me a Netflix comedy special like Nanette or Michael Che matters, and I am ready to dig in and go deep. And if you're just jumping into this series, no prob. I got you.
Let me catch you up with our cast of characters. King Xerxes. Now in the history of translation, this guy has a few names. In Hebrew, he's Achashrosh. In the Greek translation of Hebrew, he's Artaxerxes.
And in our NIV and in Persian history, he's Exerxes the first, ruler of Persia from April to April and defeated by the Greeks in April. Now little is known of this king's fourteen year reign, and the king we find in our story is less historical, more legend. Queen Vashti, in chapter one, is summoned by Xerxes but refuses to parade before the king and his guests. After all, they've been drinking for days and days and days. And as a result, the king removes her as queen.
Essentially, she's erased. And her removal incites the search for a new queen. And I honestly don't find Vashti's story funny, but I love a woman who says no without hedging. Mordecai is a Jewish man whose family line goes all the way to King Saul. He's the guardian of his cousin Esther.
Esther. And Mordecai has a position at the king's gate, making him something as a an as of an informant of the throne. So this guy has feet in two worlds. Mordecai, he managed to make a life for himself as an ex ile in Persia. Now, the conflict in the story is between Mordecai and the politician Haman.
Boo, Haman. It results in an epic reversal and a big deadly mess, but that's to be continued. Esther, my queen, is a young Jewish woman living in the Persian diaspora. And her cousin turned guardian senses trouble for their people, so he enters her into a beauty contest. This is more like a contest traffics in women, wherein she charms the socks off of everyone and, da da da da, becomes the new queen.
And later in the story, Esther's character and her wits come to life, so stay tuned for that. Today,
Speaker 1: we
Speaker 2: meet the villain of the story, Haman, in all his erratic, maniacal, evil plotting shame. He's the guy we love to hate. If you like an outline like I do, here's yours for today. Part one, sworn enemies. Part two, sinister plots.
Part three, law of hate. And part four, a city bewildered. But before all the action gets rolling, please join me in prayer. There is a wise saying that goes like this. Togetherness is mercy.
Disunity is torture. Loving God. That could be our whole prayer. A prayer for togetherness. A confession of disunity.
For those carrying a burden today, maybe awareness of a child struggling with school, a friend we're not sure how to help, a deep sense of anxiety and worry. Oh Christ, will you be near? Spirit, as we consider disruptions in relationships, our families, our communities, our countries, and of course the whole world, show us the divine way of compassion that we may heal and help others to heal. Together we pray. Amen.
So, Esther, chapter three. After these events, King Xerxes honored Haman, son of Hamadatha, the Agagite, Agagite, elevating him and giving him a seat of honor higher than that of all the other nobles. All the royal officials at the king's gate knelt down and paid honor to Haman, for the king had commanded this concerning him. But Mordecai would not kneel down or pay him honor. Then the royal officials at the king's gate asked Mordecai, why do you disobey the king's command?
Day after day, they to him, but he refused to comply. Therefore, they told Haman about it to see whether Mordecai's behavior would be tolerated for he had told them he was a Jew. The chapter opens with the catapulted rise of Haman. In English, but especially in Hebrew, there's an emphasis on Haman's ascent and status. Verbs blast Haman past the reader to a powerful place in the king's court.
Gadol, to grow up, to make great. Nasa, to lift, to carry. Tsum, to set over. All describe how Haman takes the high position in the court. And some interpreters say as if he were the king himself.
And a detail easily missed has to do with where Haman comes from. Truth be told, he's not Persian. He's an Amalekite, a descendant of Esau, and more importantly, king Egge's descendant from first Samuel. And here, if you're Jewish and you were in temple recently where you heard the Nevi'im of Samuel read aloud, you'd remember that King Agag was supposed to die at the hands of King Saul, tracing a pact back to Exodus where God promised to blot out the name of Amalek. But Saul, that rascal, he let Agag go, an insult to the command of God.
So here's what you're left with. Mordecai's people are descendants of Saul. Haman's people are descendants of Egge. And these two houses are in perpetual conflict. Haters gotta hate.
Now it helps to ask, what kind of story is this? And that question is just good reading practice. Think about how you read novels. Mystery, steamy romance, science fiction. It's easier for you to drop into the story when you know it's kind.
Well, here, Persian, but especially Greek storytellers, love what's called a courtier tale. This is when two dudes in the royal court are out for each other. Fun. Right? So to recap, as a courtier tale, Haman, is essentially the new prime minister, says bow.
And Mordecai, the king's informant says, no. And other officials say, Mordi, why won't you bow? And the king commands it. And Mordecai says, nope. Not gonna bow.
The text says Mordecai's refusal has something to do with his Jewishness. But is it that Mordecai doesn't believe in bowing to anyone but God? Is it, as some rabbis write, that Haman has this symbol of a pagan god on his breastplate so, of course, Mordecai won't bow to an idol? Or does it go back to these guys hating each other because they're families? Well, they've always hated each other.
And biblical scholar Adel Berlin points out, while Mordecai's refusal to bow endangers the entire Jewish people, there is no reason stated. This text does not deliver you a simple explanation. Sorry. Probably not that sorry. The lack of rationale is it's actually really key to me.
Hatred rises in chapter three. Haman hates that Mordecai won't bow down, and Mordecai has his hate on for Haman. But what's behind that hate is simply not stated, sure. We can look around in the story and see family feuds and clashes, but there's a gap, a hesitation to spell it all out. The truth about our hate is that it can be so shallow.
Not a lot under the surface to make sense. Hate gets carried away. Hate makes you lose your cool. Hate has a hollowness that is easy to manipulate. Maybe you hated someone for so long but you kinda forgot what started it.
Maybe you felt such hate online. You reposted a meme that was so mean, and if you're honest, not represent who you want to be. Maybe you were hurt. And instead of fixing what happened, you fired up your hate and threw a heap of dry wood on that fire. We have all been there.
But that fire, it gets so dangerous. Then Esther, hate becomes a sinister plot. So Haman, he hears what Mordecai refuses to do to bow. And you'll never believe it. Haman is enraged.
Okay. You probably believe it because we've seen royal rage in this story before. And where we might conclude that Haman has this fragile ego, the culture here is more interested in honor and shame. And for many of us, honor and shame are profoundly individualized and internalized. Like, I live with my shame deep down down.
But in this ancient world and maybe in your culture, honor and shame are about people knowing their place in a group. Did your actions insult the social arrangement? Did you disrupt that order when you disrespected a superior? If you do disrupt honor, then your public punishment is shame. So verse six, Haman looked for a way to destroy all Mordecai's people, the Jews, through the whole kingdom of Xerxes.
Then to determine when to wreak havoc, lots or pur are cast in Haman's presence. And once Haman's chosen a time, he says to King Xerxes, there is a certain group of people dispersed among the peoples in all the provinces of your kingdom who keep themselves separate. So fact check. That's true. Their customs are different from those of all other people and they do not obey the king's laws.
Fact check. That's only half true. True. Customs are different. But as far as we can see, they follow the king.
Haman continues, It is not in the king's best interest to tolerate them. Fact check. That's a wily lie. Verse nine. If it pleases the king, let a decree be issued to destroy them, and I will give 10,000 talents of silver to the king's administrators for the royal treasury.
The king is duped into the deception but says, Haman, it's your money, and you can do with it what you want. According to some estimates, Haman was offering two thirds the annual income of Persia. So just in case you forgot you were in a comedy, now you remember that sum is absurd. And the king finishes the scene handing his signet ring over to Haman. Do what you want with these people.
As if to say, like, what do I care? Now we could read this as straight up antisemitism. Haman justifies his hate for Mordecai by making cultural differences threat. But the truth is there's no evidence that this kind of anti Judaism existed in Persia. And according to the Hebrew scholar Robert Alter, the Persian Empire was tolerant of minorities.
That doesn't mean, however, that the author isn't aware of some kind of early form of antisemitism. The writer of Esther knows about being hated. Maybe that's the thing with hate. It's always with us. It doesn't come out of nowhere.
We carry the violence done to and by the people whose genes give us our brown eyes, our crooked teeth, our creaky bones. At some point in your family's history, someone was traumatized and had to run for their life. Or let's face it, someone you're related to harmed someone else. We cannot escape the hatred of what it means to be human and at home on this pale blue dot in space. Our history of hundreds of thousands of years is full of human conflict.
The scientific inquiry of this trauma retention is known as epigenetics. Cells hold the memory of hate. So what do we do with the hate that we carry? Well, since being married, my husband points out unreasonable responses I have to things I hate. Like, I will get it in my head that I just hate a coffee shop.
Not in the city, of course. Like, I will hate it. And he says, Bobby, what did that place ever do to you? And of course, it's silly, and I'll probably always hate certain things for no good reason. But I also hate things for a good reason.
The same is true for you. I know that people have hurt you, come for you, wanted to destroy something in you. You're human. You hold that. But if, in turn, you hold more hate than grace, more hardness than softness, more revenge than restoration.
I need you. We need you to back that truck up. Like pedal to the metal. Steer out of that shadowy place before you do something or become someone you can't stand. Of course, the story of hatred, it's not at all over in Esther.
We are going further. Haman is about to lay down the law of hate. Okay. Heads up. The language here is violent and the plan is Bruno.
They summon the royal secretaries, kings, satraps, governors, nobles, all receive the very serious message sealed with the very important ring written in the name of the very powerful king. It reads, destroy, kill, and annihilate all the Jews, young and old women and children in a single day. Also, while you're at it, take their stuff. Verse 14. A copy of the text of the edict was to be issued as law in every province and made known to the people of every nationality so they would be ready for that day.
The empire had eleven months to prepare. The eleven month pause is a literary device. It suspends the moment of anticipated horror. It's a cliffhanger. Like, will the slaughter succeed?
Will people die on what would be the day before their Passover feast? Is this where the story goes? And just as God is not on the page in Esther, no one prays out loud, God does not speak audibly through a prophet, there's no celestial presence in a fiery furnace. Just as God is not on the page, neither is the devil. In Esther, evil resides in the heart of man and spreads out from there.
At the onset of World War II, the French philosopher Simone Weil wrote this assessment of evil. She said, When we do evil, we do not know it because evil flies from the light. With hatred, manipulation of the truth, and greed, Haman makes sure the wheels of the kingdom grind forward with laws and politicians and everyday people organized to kill. There is no trust, no humility, no inward reflection, only the dim hate of a man spreading across the land like fatal plague. What do we do with that?
How do we make sense of mobilized hate? Do we just get caught up in the darkness that pulls us from the light? Well, I wanna tell you about my friend, Eddie Hillesam. Okay. The truth is we never met.
Eddie was a Dutch Jewish woman who died in Auschwitz when she was 29 years old. But I have to tell you, I feel like I know Eddie. While studying Esther, I've been reading Eddie's journals, Left Behind and published only in 1981, called An Interrupted Life. And it turns out, and I didn't know this when I partnered Esther with Eddie, that Eddie is short for Esther. It was news to me.
But it's like a friendship kinda meant to be me and Eddie and Esther. What Eddie is known for is her deepened inner life as she got closer and closer to her death. She left behind 10 notebooks where she wrote about cultivating a quiet hour to clean up inner litter. And she wrote about being present to where you are with your whole heart. And she wrote about learning to pray and to work well with God.
And here's what Eddie sounds like. On 05/29/1942, a Friday morning, Eddie wrote, It is sometimes hard to take in and comprehend, oh God, what those created in your likeness do to each other in these disjointed days. But I no longer shut myself away in my room, God. I try to look things straight in the face, even the worst crimes, and to discover the small, naked human being amid the monstrous wreckage caused by man's senseless deeds. Miss the grip of Nazi power tightens around Eddie.
She writes about how she and her mentor, who also is her lover, cannot put Eddie in a box. The two of them, they were no longer allowed to ride the tram in Amsterdam. The yellow star of David marks them as unwelcome. Eddie knows horror is coming for her and still she writes. I can sit for hours and know everything and bear everything and grow stronger in the bearing of it.
And at the same time, feel sure that life is beautiful and worth living and meaningful despite everything. Now before you go thinking, Well, I could never be like that. Just hold up a moment. Because here's the deal with Eddie. She was doing what's available to us all.
She paid attention. Evil bewildered her, but it did not define her. You know what defined Eddie right up to her death? I'll tell you. She refused to believe that hate, destruction, threat, fear, and horror are what we are.
She saw hate for what it is, but she refused it for herself. That is power. In the final scene of the chapter, the abuse of power makes heads spin. Verse 15 ends chapter three. The couriers went out, spurred by the king's command, and the edict was issued in the citadel of Susa.
The king and Haman sat down to drink, but the city of Susa was bewildered. We have this outside, inside, outside pattern in this last verse. The couriers head out from the citadel to carry the command. And the king and Haman, they sit down inside to drink. And the city outside their walls is bewildered.
It's dizzying. Here's the thing about the plan Haman has set in action. His plan is going to backfire and result in his demise. Not only that, but the next time Haman is with the king at a banquet, Esther will be host. Esther will make plans.
Esther will save her people. But that's next week. Today's scene ends with the city of Susa functioning like a Greek chorus. Their collective voices sing out in confusion. The scene leaves us with the contrast of a drinking king and a muddled kingdom.
And so we wonder, does hate ever make sense? Here's where I think we start with hate. We welcome a chorus of bewilderment. When we see hate in our history, hate in our laws, hate on our social media feed, when we see hate between nations, hate pulling the trigger of guns, hate in our misery, when we see hate in our families, hate on our highways, hate in our private hearts. Let it mess you up a bit.
Do not be afraid to name it, but resist the urge to add to it. What do you do with hate? Try something from this list, one I've compiled from my near forty three years on this earth. Write about your hate. Talk it over with a friend.
Find a prayer you can say on repeat. Seek out a sacred text that speaks of love. Ask curious questions. Get the backstory. Move through your anger.
Watch a comedy special. Join a 12 step program. Insist on a hopeful alternative. Hear Jesus say, How about we try healing instead? Rather than hate.
Do that. Okay? Just do some of that. Let us pray. Oh, loving God, we confess that we even now have hate in our hearts.
And we know, God, that there is a wicked tapestry of hate in our world. Oh, won't you kind of seem rip it out of us gently? Won't you remind us that we do not need to fear these evil forces because love and creativity and hope and gentleness and patience and newness are always, always on offer. Jesus, you lived with without hate, maybe throwing some shade at our sin, but never at our souls. So Spirit of the living God present with us now, enter the places of our hate and our wounds and our worry and heal us of all that harms us.
Amen.