Читать книгу Stories of the Wars of the Jews - A. L. O. E. - Страница 6

Table of Contents

The Jewish Maiden—The Conspiracy Discovered—Haman’s Plot—A Mourning Nation—The Golden Sceptre—The Queen’s Banquet.

Artaxerxes,[2] or, as he is termed in the Scriptures, Ahasuerus, sat on the throne of Persia. Lord of the widest kingdom which then existed upon earth—a kingdom which extended from India to Ethiopia, and comprised a hundred and twenty-seven provinces—the will of the monarch was the law to which many nations were constrained to bow. Ahasuerus possessed neither the wisdom nor the self-command requisite in one to whom power so vast is intrusted. He chose for his chief favourite and minister Haman, an Amalekite, a man of unbounded cruelty and pride, and dismissed his own queen for venturing to disobey a capricious command given to her by her husband, when he was probably under the influence of wine.

In choosing another partner of his state to fill the place of the dethroned Queen Vashti, the despot sought for no higher qualification than that of personal attractions. But the Almighty Disposer of events guided the choice of the monarch.

SITE OF SHUSHAN OR SUSA.

In the palace of Shushan was a certain Jew, named Mordecai, of the tribe of Benjamin. With a father’s care he had reared Esther, a young orphan maiden, a relative of his own. The Jewess was possessed of exquisite beauty; amongst the fair she was the fairest; Ahasuerus saw her, loved her, and raised the beauteous captive to the rank of the queen of Persia.

Her elevation appears to have had no effect in changing the character of this daughter of Abraham. In the palace of Ahasuerus, surrounded by luxury and pomp, Esther preserved her faith to the God of her fathers, though by the charge of Mordecai she kept her nation and kindred secret from the king. While placed in a position far above that of her early benefactor, the young queen still rendered to Mordecai the dutiful obedience of a daughter. Through her the Jew made known to Ahasuerus a secret plot to assassinate him, which had been made by two of his chamberlains. The conspirators suffered the punishment of death, but he to whose timely warning the king owed the preservation of his life, sat day after day in the gate of the royal palace, unrewarded and neglected.

Through this gate passed Haman, the proud favourite of the Persian monarch. As he moved on with a stately step amongst the courtiers and servants of the king, every head, save one, was bowed down before him—all did him obeisance save one! That one was Mordecai, the bold, un-compromising Jew, who scorned to pay any mark of respect to him who was the enemy of his faith—to him who belonged to the guilty tribe doomed by a just God to destruction.

QUEEN ESTHER.

Haman was not a man to forgive that which he looked upon as an insult. Boiling with rage, he determined that not only should Mordecai expiate his offence with his life, but that the whole of his race should be swept away by one act of indiscriminate vengeance. The arbitrary temper of Ahasuerus, and his blind confidence in his wicked minister, too well seconded the bloody designs of Haman. This unprincipled favourite succeeded in obtaining from the despot a decree for the extermination of the Jewish people throughout all of his extensive dominions. Neither age nor sex were to be spared; the babe was to be slaughtered in the arms of its mother, and the spoil of the murdered victims was to be the prey of the merciless Haman! A time was actually fixed upon by lot for the perpetration of the horrible massacre, but, by the providence of God, the lot fell upon a distant day. Their consciences untroubled by a sense of their enormous guilt, Ahasuerus and Haman sat down to feast and to drink, while all Shushan was startled by the fearful decree that was to destroy a peaceful nation from the face of the earth!

When Mordecai heard of the king’s commandment, he rent his clothes, and put on sackcloth with ashes, and went out into the midst of the city, and cried with a loud and bitter cry. And in every province into which the king’s decree came, there was great mourning amongst the Jews, and fasting, and weeping, and wailing; and many lay in sackcloth and ashes. Esther heard of the deep , though, secluded as she was in the royal apartments, she seems not to have been fully aware of its cause. She sent Hatach, the king’s chamberlain, to Mordecai, and received through him a copy of the dreadful decree, and a charge to go herself to the despot, and make supplication for her persecuted people.

This message threw the young queen into great perplexity and distress. For thirty days the capricious monarch had expressed no wish to see her, and to enter unbidden into his presence exposed any intruder to the penalty of death, unless the monarch should extend his golden sceptre in token of pardon and grace. Through the medium of Hatach, Esther communicated her difficulties and fears to Mordecai. But to the resolute spirit of the Jew but one path appeared open to his adopted daughter, and that was the path of duty. Whatever might be the difficulty, she must brave it; whatever might be the danger, she must dare it! He reminded Esther that it was probably for this very purpose that she had been raised to share the throne of Ahasuerus.

The reply of the queen showed her piety and her obedience, and her resolution at all hazards to intercede for her nation. She besought Mordecai to gather together all the Jews that were then in Shushan, that they might plead for her with that Almighty Ruler in whose hand are the hearts of kings. She promised that at the end of three days, which she would herself devote to solemn prayer, she would appear before Ahasuerus, concluding her message with the touching words, “And if I perish, I perish!”

The third day arrived, and the trembling Esther prepared to redeem her promise. She put on her royal apparel, the rich garments and glittering jewels whose splendour seemed a mockery of the fear and sorrow of her whom they adorned. And so Esther ventured into the presence of the despot, not armed with great natural courage, but leaning on that invisible Protector who can give strength to the weak and heroism to the fearful. Ahasuerus beheld his beauteous queen, and all his affection towards her revived: he held out his golden sceptre, and perceiving that no light motive could have induced her to brave the peril of death, “What wilt thou, Queen Esther?” he cried; “and what is thy request? It shall be given to thee to the half of the kingdom.”

ESTHER APPEARING BEFORE KING AHASUERUS.

Notwithstanding the relief which the young Jewess experienced at the first peril being happily past, she was not yet prepared to disclose the secret of her race, hitherto carefully concealed. She confined herself to a request that the king and Haman should that day attend a banquet which she had prepared.

The request was instantly granted; the monarch and his favourite appeared at the feast; and again Ahasuerus gave a gracious promise to his queen—“What is thy request? even to the half of the kingdom it shall be performed.” Again Esther sought a brief delay. She entreated her lord to come with Haman to another banquet on the morrow, and promised that she then would declare the subject of her anxious desires.

Haman left the presence of the queen glad, and with a joyful heart. Honoured as no other subject had been honoured, the spirit of the Amalekite was lifted up with pride. He approached the gate at which Mordecai still sat. Surely now the firmness of the Jew will give way; he will yield reverence at last to one who has so fearfully shown his disposition to revenge, and his power to gratify it. No! Mordecai stoops not, and the tyrant passes on, full of rage against one whom he may kill, but whom he cannot conquer.

On what a slight thread hangs human happiness, when such a breath can destroy it! Haman had all that the world could give, but one evil passion, like a viper in the breast, poisoned in a moment every spring of enjoyment. He went to his home a miserable man—so miserable, that he was constrained to publish to others what was humiliating to himself. Haman called for his friends, and Zeresh his wife, and told them of the glory of his riches, the multitude of his children, the favour of his sovereign, and the repeated invitations with which Esther the queen had honoured him; closing all with this striking confession of the vanity of earthly greatness—“Yet all this availeth me nothing, so long as I see Mordecai the Jew sitting at the gate of the king!”

Zeresh appeared a meet counsellor for so unprincipled a man as her husband. She and her friends assured Haman that the object of his hate could be easily destroyed, without waiting for the day appointed for the massacre. “Let a gallows be made fifty cubits high,” said they, “and tomorrow speak thou unto the king that Mordecai may be hanged thereon; then go thou merrily unto the banquet.”

The wicked counsel pleased Haman, and he caused the gallows at once to be made.