Esther 7: 1 – 10
Having a bad day, a very bad day
1 So the king and Haman went to dine with Queen Esther. 2 And on the second day, at the banquet of wine, the king again said to Esther, “What is your petition, Queen Esther? It shall be granted you. And what is your request, up to half the kingdom? It shall be done!” 3 Then Queen Esther answered and said, “If I have found favor in your sight, O king, and if it pleases the king, let my life be given me at my petition, and my people at my request. 4 For we have been sold, my people and I, to be destroyed, to be killed, and to be annihilated. Had we been sold as male and female slaves, I would have held my tongue, although the enemy could never compensate for the king’s loss.” 5 So King Ahasuerus answered and said to Queen Esther, “Who is he, and where is he, who would dare presume in his heart to do such a thing?” 6 And Esther said, “The adversary and enemy is this wicked Haman!” So Haman was terrified before the king and queen. 7 Then the king arose in his wrath from the banquet of wine and went into the palace garden; but Haman stood before Queen Esther, pleading for his life, for he saw that evil was determined against him by the king. 8 When the king returned from the palace garden to the place of the banquet of wine, Haman had fallen across the couch where Esther was. Then the king said, “Will he also assault the queen while I am in the house?” As the word left the king’s mouth, they covered Haman’s face. 9 Now Harbonah, one of the eunuchs, said to the king, “Look! The gallows, fifty cubits high, which Haman made for Mordecai, who spoke good on the king’s behalf, is standing at the house of Haman.” Then the king said, “Hang him on it!” 10 So they hanged Haman on the gallows that he had prepared for Mordecai. Then the king’s wrath subsided.
A man in California was working on his motorcycle on the patio, his wife nearby in the kitchen. While racing the engine, the motorcycle accidentally slipped into gear. The man, still holding onto the handlebars, was dragged along as it burst through the glass patio doors. His wife, hearing the crash, ran in the room to find her husband cut and bleeding, the motorcycle damaged, and the patio door shattered. She called for an ambulance and, because the house sat on a large hill, went down the several flights of stairs to meet the paramedics and escort them to her husband. While the attendants were loading her husband, the wife managed to right the motorcycle and push it outside. She also quickly blotted up the spilled gasoline with some paper towels and tossed them into the toilet. After being treated and released, the man returned home, looked at the shattered patio door and the damage done to his motorcycle. He went into the bathroom and consoled himself with a cigarette while attending to his business. About to stand, he flipped the butt between his legs. The wife, who was in the kitchen, heard a loud explosion and her husband screaming. Finding him lying on the bathroom floor with his trousers blown away and burns on his buttocks, legs and groin, she once again phoned for an ambulance. The same paramedic crew was dispatched. As the paramedics carried the man down the stairs to the ambulance they asked the wife how he had come to burn himself. She told them. They started laughing so hard, one slipped, the stretcher dumping the husband out. He fell down the remaining stairs, breaking his arm. I can rightly say that he had a bad day – a very bad day. How about you?
Today we are going to read about someone else who is going to have a bad day – a very bad day. Let us jump right into another very interesting series of events.
In 5.4-14 the First Banquet was described, at which Esther began her appeal, a banquet which caused Haman to be exultant, so much so that he prepared a stake for his arch-enemy. Now we have the second banquet where the situation reverses. Esther finalizes her appeal, and Haman is brought to despair, and is impaled on the stake that he had prepared for Mordecai. And the turning point around which this was change was based was the king’s night of sleeplessness, and the learning of Mordecai’s loyalty. It was clear that God had intervened on behalf of His people.
1 So the king and Haman went to dine with Queen Esther.
This was in accordance with 5.4 where Esther’s request was that the king and Haman come to her banquet. The fulfilment of the request is continuing. Esther’s plan is coming to completion.
2 And on the second day, at the banquet of wine, the king again said to Esther, “What is your petition, Queen Esther? It shall be granted you. And what is your request, up to half the kingdom? It shall be done!”
The first day was of course the previous day, the day of the first banquet. That too was ‘a banquet of wine’. Note how this verse is very similar to 5.6, but with the addition of ‘on the second day’ and ‘Queen Esther’. This is a continuation of the first feast, but the king’s request is more formal and more exalting of Esther. He is now expecting her reply. Courtesies have been fulfilled. Now as his Queen she may make her request. And he assures her again that whatever she asks will be granted.
3 Then Queen Esther answered and said, “If I have found favor in your sight, O king, and if it pleases the king, let my life be given me at my petition, and my people at my request. 4 For we have been sold, my people and I, to be destroyed, to be killed, and to be annihilated. Had we been sold as male and female slaves, I would have held my tongue, although the enemy could never compensate for the king’s loss.”
Comparison with 5.7-8 illustrates how abruptly Esther now speaks. She is feeling very emotional. There she commenced with ‘my petition and my request are --.’ Here she goes straight to the heart of the matter. She is clearly speaking under great stress. She speaks as one who knows that her very life is at stake, although she still observes the necessary courtesies. Thus she pleads for her own life, and for the lives of her people, explaining that both she and her people have been ‘sold’ to be destroyed, to be slain and to perish. There is a reference here in the verb ‘sold’ to the price that Haman had offered to the king to obtain his ends (3.9). Please take note also the three description of the verbs, ‘to be destroyed -- to be slain -- to perish’. They are a citation of what was said in the decree. She wants the king to recognize the completeness of the destruction that is being planned. It is nothing less than total annihilation. She then further underlines the severity of the situation by pointing out that had it been that they were merely being sold into slavery she would not have troubled the king with the matter. She was only doing so because the consequences were so total.
It will be noted that she makes no reference as to who her people are. Neither the king of Haman necessarily recognize the fact that she is speaking about the Jews, although Haman may have felt a lurch in his heart because he knew that he was responsible for so much and it may have dawned on him that she was speaking about his obsessive hatred the Jews in view of the pressure he was under with regard to them. This anonymity was a wise move on Esther’s part as it did not produce a conflict in the king’s mind as he was considering the matter. Thus, he received the full impact of her words without being bothered by secondary considerations.
‘But as things are the adversary could not have compensated for the king’s damage.” If we translate in this way the idea here is that as things stand the benefits from the destruction of the Jews will not compensate for (be equal to) the loss that will be suffered because of that destruction having in mind both their value as people and their productive capacity. It would be like killing the goose which laid the golden egg. He might find a golden egg, but the supply of golden eggs would cease. This would parallel the way in which Haman too had appealed to the king’s self-interest. She is thus seen as pointing out that Haman is not offering enough to justify the loss that will result.
5 So King Ahasuerus answered and said to Queen Esther, “Who is he, and where is he, who would dare presume in his heart to do such a thing?”
Unaware that his own ring has sealed the fate of the people to whom Esther is referring the king is furious. Who dared to threaten his queen? Who was he and where was he? He was filled with anger. It was almost like an attack on his own person. ‘Said -- and said’ emphasizes the vehemence with which he spoke.
6 And Esther said, “The adversary and enemy is this wicked Haman!” So, Haman was terrified before the king and queen.
We do not know at what point it dawned on Haman that she was speaking about him, possibly not until this moment when Esther denounced him. Such men have little conscience. Thus when she spoke, looking directly at him, it must have come home to him as a death blow. He had been so confident that the Jews were at his mercy, even though he had suffered a setback regarding Mordecai. But now it would have dawned on him to his horror that the Queen herself was also a Jewess. If only he had known that.
Esther meanwhile makes full play of the situation by firstly indicating that the one who had done it was ‘an adversary and an enemy’ of hers, arousing more of the king’s concern as he wondered who so evil, and then turning and denouncing Haman could be openly in no uncertain terms. She could not hide the bitterness in her heart as she described him as ‘this wicked Haman’. We can appreciate the terror that must have struck Haman to his very heart. From exulting in being the queen’s favorite he has collapsed into being her bitter enemy. He had heard the promises that the king had made to Esther concerning the fulfilment of her request, and he knew how strongly the king felt about her. He would know that even the king’s liking for him would not combat such things. Nor could he expect mercy from the very woman he had condemned to death. No wonder he was ‘afraid before the king and queen’.
7 Then the king arose in his wrath from the banquet of wine and went into the palace garden; but Haman stood before Queen Esther, pleading for his life, for he saw that evil was determined against him by the king.
The king was so angry that his queen should be treated in this way by one whom he had trusted that he arose from the table at which he was reclining and sought refuge in the palace garden. But according to his words in 8.7 (‘because he laid his hand on the Jews’) he was also angry that Haman had plotted against the Jews and had not made the fact clear to him. The king clearly saw no harm in the Jews. No doubt he was now considering what he ought to do. Or perhaps he was simply seeking to control his seething rage. Either way his mind was soon made up.
Meanwhile Haman, who knew the king well, had no doubt what he would do. The king had the power of instant life and death, and he knew that he was one who acted swiftly in such matters as his past demonstrated. The one who could react to a loyal supporter’s plea that his eldest son be spared to him for his old age, by killing the eldest son, cutting his body in half, and marching his troops between the two halves, would not be likely to show mercy to someone who had threatened his queen. So Haman did the only thing open to him, he rose from his place to plead for his life before the queen. The irony is clear. The man who hated the Jews because they would not humble themselves before him, and sought their destruction, must now humble himself before a Jewess for his very life. But in his desperation, and possibly even somewhat faint with shock as the horror of his situation came home to him, he acted even more foolishly. Possibly physically no longer able to stand upright as his legs gave way under him he fell on, and scrabbled at, the end of the couch on which the queen was lying.
Had he been thinking rationally he would have followed the king out. Such was court etiquette that to remain alone with the queen was an act of folly. But he was not thinking rationally, and he was possibly trembling, with his legs weakened to such an extent that to follow the king would not have been possible. Thus, when he became fully aware of his situation, Esther appeared to be his only hope and he determined to make his plea for mercy. But thereby he brought on himself the inevitable. To even touch the queen’s couch would have been enough to require his execution.
8 When the king returned from the palace garden to the place of the banquet of wine, Haman had fallen across the couch where Esther was. Then the king said, “Will he also assault the queen while I am in the house?” As the word left the king’s mouth, they covered Haman’s face.
When the king returned, angry and no doubt in a somewhat drunken state, it was to see his queen lying on her couch, not alone, but with Haman seemingly bent on molesting her. He was not in a state to reason sensibly. He would think rather in terms of his own sensual predispositions. So in drunken confusion he may well have thought in terms of rape. But ‘force the queen’ is possibly not intended to be seen like that. Rather he may have meant - force the queen by making threats to get her to plead on his behalf. Either way the royal servants present, seeing what was the look on the king’s face, acted immediately. They ‘covered Haman’s face’. This was a sign that they saw him as disgraced and doomed. The king could not be allowed to look on the face of a condemned man.
9 Now Harbonah, one of the eunuchs, said to the king, “Look! The gallows, fifty cubits high, which Haman made for Mordecai, who spoke good on the king’s behalf, is standing at the house of Haman.” Then the king said, “Hang him on it!”
Haman clearly excited no sympathy among the servants. He was the type who would treat ‘lesser men’ with disdain. Thus, they were all only too ready to assist with his condemnation. And one of them, a close personal servant of the king (he was ‘before the king’), who was named Harbonah, pointed out to the king, possibly with some satisfaction, that there was a suitable stake available for Haman to be impaled on, one indeed that he had made for that Mordecai who had proved such a good friend to the king, and who had just been honored by wearing the king’s clothes. What was more the stake was standing in the very house of Haman (in the courtyard). The king replied without any hesitation, ‘impale him on it’. It was the kind of instantaneous action which was typical of him.
10 So they hanged Haman on the gallows that he had prepared for Mordecai. Then the king’s wrath subsided.
The passage ends with what can be the overall message of the passage, that fortune had ceased to favor Haman and was now veering towards Mordecai. From now on Haman was finished and Mordecai was on the ascendant. ‘So they impaled Haman on the stake that he had prepared for Mordecai.’ It was a clear picture of the changed situation.
And in consequence ‘the king’s anger was pacified’. The one who had plotted against his queen, and who had even dared to touch the couch that she was lying on, had received his just reward.
