verse involves other chronological difficulties, making Nehemiah live in the time of Jaddua, the high priest, in the reign of Darius Codomannus; consequently, he must have lived at least one hundred and fifty years. It may have been on account of this chronological difficulty that Josephus departs from this authority. The next verse must likewise be considered an interpolation, as the two are so closely united.] having con CHAPTER IX. THE BOOK OF ESTHER." § 198, a. CONTENTS AND CREDIBILITY OF THE BOOK OF ESTHER. THIS narrative relates that Esther, a Jewess, without cated mit regard to her Jewish origin, was raised to the dignity of rschweig-queen, by Ahasuerus, the Persian king;' that the sing) J. J. Rambach. Annotatt. in Lib. Esth.; (Uberr. Annotatt. in Hagiogr. vol. ii.) Oliv. Bonart. Comm. litter. et mor. in Lib. Esth.; Col. 1647, fol. See the old opinions about Ahasuerus, in Carpzov, vol. i. p. 356, sqq. Gesenius, in Ersch and Gruber's Encyclop. vol. ii. p. 238. The following authors think he was Xerxes: Scaliger, De Emend. Temp. lib. vi., Animadvers. Eusebianæ, p. 101, sqq. Drusius, Pfeiffer, Carpzov, and most of the moderns; e. g. L. J. C. Justi, on King Ahasuerus, in Eichhorn's Repert. vol. xv., and in his own Vermischte Abhand. No. 2. Eichhorn, § 508. Jahn, vol. ii. p. 298, sqq. Bertholdt, p. 2422, sqq. Gesenius, Thesaurus Heb. sub voce. Hävernik, vol. ii. pt. i. p. 339. Mich. Baumgarten, De Fide Lib. Estheris; 1839, p. 129, sqq. destruction of the Jews in the Persian kingdom was resolved upon by Haman, but prevented by Esther and Mordecai, her foster-father; that Haman was ruined, and Mordecai elevated to his place, and that permission was given to the Jews to take bloody vengeance upon their enemies; in memory of which, the feast of Purim was instituted. It violates all historical probability, and contains the most striking difficulties, and many errors with regard to Persian manners, as well as just references to them." The main point on which the authenticity of this book has been rested, namely, that Ahasuerus is the same with Xerxes, is very doubtful. If they are the same, then the expedition against Greece must have taken place between the third year of his reign, when Vashti is repudiated, (i. 3,) and the seventh, when Esther is made queen, (ii. 16.) Now, no mention of that event is made in this book, which can only be accounted for on the supposition that the author knew nothing of it. But after the seventh year, history speaks of other favorites, and another wife of Xerxes; namely, Amestris, who, it is acknowledged, was not Esther. The hypothesis that he had many wives beside her, — for which the uncertain passage, ii. 17, has been adduced, is improbable, on account of his fear of Amestris; and, besides, in ii. 17, sqq., Esther is distinctly For the ancient and modern doubts, see Oeder, Freie Untersuch. üb. d. Kan. d. A. T. p. 12, sqq. Michaelis, Or. Bib. vol. ii. p. 35, sqq. Anmerk. ub. d. B. Esther. Corrodi, Beleucht. d. Gesch. d. Jüd. Kanon. vol. i. p. 66, sqq. Bertholdt, p. 2425. He considers the whole book a fiction. See, on the other side, Eichhorn, § 510. Jahn, p. 305, sqq. Kelle, Vindic. Esther; 1820. Hävernik, p. 339, sqq. Baumgarten, 1. c. p. 10, sqq. Michaelis, in loc. On the other side, Justi, Verm. Abhand. vol. i. p. 81. Baumgarlen, p. 140. called the queen. There would be a most decided argument against this view, if the twelfth, and not, as is the common opinion, the twenty-first," year of Xerxes, when Haman, and then Mordecai, were his grand viziers, were his last year; for, about this time, Artabanus, chief of his body-guard, who murdered Xerxes, controlled him. According to the most natural construction of ii. 5, 6, Mordecai must have been carried into exile with Jechoniah; consequently, at the time these events took place, he must have been about one hundred and twenty years old, and Esther must have been a superannuated beauty.” From what we know of Persian manners, it is improbable that the king should invite Vashti, his wife, not to a banquet, but to a Bacchanalian carousal: it would only be possible on account of the advancing corruption in Xerxes' time, and through the folly of Xerxes himself. It is not probable that he would have chosen Esther a person not descended from one of the seven families from which the queens were exclusively taken -for his queen; nor that he would have granted royal honors to Mordecai, because we know not how he had detected a conspiracy. This account of the honor paid Mordecai has affinity with the reward of Joseph, (Gen. xli. 43,) and on that account is suspicious. From what we know of the base character and despotism of Xerxes, it may perhaps be believed that Haman obtained from him a decree for the extirpation of Vitringa, Obs. sac. Lib. vi. 2. Hengstenberg, Christol. vol. ii. p. 541, sqq. Krüger, in Seebode, Archiv. vol. i. pt. ii. p. 205, sqq. Baumgarten, p. 146. On the other side, Kleinert, in the Dörpt. Beit. vol. ii. See Rambach, in loc. Baumgarten, p. 45. But see Herodotus, iii. 88, Ctesias, Pers. xx., and Heeren, 1. c. p. 398. d Baumgarten, p. 38-44. the Jews, and Mordecai, in return, obtained a corresponding counter decree. But it is incredible that the Jews, in consequence of this last decree, went to work so fiercely, and massacred more than seventy-five thousand Persians. It was only the national vanity of the Jews that could induce the author to write this, or that all Shushan was thrown into consternation by Haman's decree, but into joy by that of Mordecai. The weakest part of the story is this-that Esther concealed her Jewish descent, not only until she was queen, (ii. 20,) but, as it appears, until the catastrophe itself was over, (viii. 1 ;) that Haman suspected nothing of it, or of her relation to Mordecai, though he came every day into the court of the palace, - for if he had known this, he would have done differently,—and also that the king himself knew nothing of it, and therefore is struck with surprise at her petition (vii. 5) for herself and her nation. § 198, b. THE SAME SUBJECT CONTINUED. It is incontestable that the feast of Purim (ix. 20, sqq.) originated in Persia, and was occasioned by an event similar to that related in Esther. But, farther than this, perhaps it is not possible to determine how much of the whole narrative is historically true. Although it is simple in style, and free from declamation, and in this way is advantageously distinguished from the similar stories in the Apocrypha,-in particular from the third book of Maccabees, - yet it breathes the spirit of revenge and haughtiness. The book refers nothing to the opera * See ix. 13. But see how Baumgarten (p. 61, sq.) attempts to defend it. tion and direction of God, and contains no religious element, except in the value put upon the refusal to worship Haman, (iii. 2,) in the fast that was kept, (iv. 16,) and the allusion to the restoration of the Jews, (iv. 14.) Even the name of God is not once mentioned. It is probable these peculiarities are to be explained as belonging to the spirit of the Persian Jews. However, Baumgarten finds in this a proof of the author's historical fidelity, who wished to depict the history of Mordecai and Esther in the light of their religious feeling, which prevented them from publicly displaying their Jewish belief. Hävernik, on the contrary, says, "The author did not wish-in the hypocritical way of the Alexandrian Jews-to conceal the conviction that the Jews were forsaken by God, and thereby lend a false coloring to the facts." But all the books written after the exile prove the falseness of this hypothesis." § 198, c. THE SAME SUBJECT CONTINUED. [For a long time this book was considered a history of actual events. Some writers at this time hold such an opinion, but it is involved in numerous and inexplicable difficulties; for the book does not bear the marks of an historical composition. 1. It is said (i. 4) that Ahasuerus made a feast unto all his princes and officers, which lasted one hundred and eighty days. How could the affairs of any government, especially an Oriental despotism, where so much See the ancient opinions in Carpzov, vol. i. p. 368, sq. Rambach, Præf. §7. See Luther's unfavorable judgment, De Servo Arbitrio, tom. iii.; Jena, Lat. p. 182. See the judgment of Gregory Nazianz., Athanasius, and the Synopsis Scrip. above, vol. i. § 25, 26. |