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Introduction
Today we are continuing our Journey in Esther.
We are picking back up where we left off at in Esther Chapter 2
Esther 2: 8 - 21
It comes time for the decree and the young were Gathered in the capital.
Was this a contest?
It is argued about if this was like a beauty contest or forced slavery.
Is it a choice she made or was this by force.
I from my point of view in my biases have a hard time seeing her choose this.
Sacrificing her virginity with 1000 other women to become queen and if you aren’t chosen then you just get to be one the harem.
But that is from my point of view.
I don’t actually have a clue.
They were taken whatever the situation it is.
I think that one of the great things about this book in its secularism is that it doesn’t get philosophical or theological in its arguments and precepts.
It deals with what is.
She was taken to the king.
It is what it is.
and Sometimes I wonder if that is an attitude that we need to take more seriously.
Things are the way they are.
We must continue to live in it.
We have to look to make the best of whatever situation that we find ourselves in.
Philippians 4:12-13
Life is what it is we need to be content in God.
That does not mean we don’t strive to make it better, or work to make our country bettor.
or that the status quo is ok.
But that we are in the situation we are in.
How can we follow God in it.
Contest Or slavery The goal is to become the queen.
She shouldn’t win
1.
She was an orphan.
She had no family connections.
She offered the king no beneficial arrangement between families of wealth or nobility.
Esther was an ordinary peasant girl—a nobody.
2.
She was up against fierce competition.
According to Josephus, the first-century Jewish historian, this contest had attracted more than 1,000 young women.
The palace was swarming with beautiful women.
Esther wasn’t the only girl turning heads.
3.
She was a Jewess.
Jews were the people of a defeated nation—outsiders who had adopted Persian ways but were still not truly Persian.
And if the news leaked out that she was a Jew, whatever slim chance she might have had of winning would immediately go down the tubes.
She might be chosen for the harem but never for the crown.
She is taken to Hegai and finds favor with him.
Spending 12 months under the regulations of their beautification.
The oil of myrrh was used to soften and lighten the skin.
Since most of the women had worked outdoors, their skin was darkened by the sun and calloused from their labors.
To the Persians, fair skin was a sign of beauty.
It took around twelve months of massage therapy and indoor living to soften and lighten the complexion of the women.8
Historians tell us that the king’s harem swam in perfumed water.
The treatments of myrrh and make-up had become an intricate science of cosmetics.
The Persians didn’t just wear make-up for beauty’s sake … they wore it for spiritual reasons.
The priests of Persia were the ones who developed and protected the formulas and practices of cosmetics.
Because they saw the physical as merely a gateway to the spiritual, they truly believed that cleanliness was, indeed, next to godliness.
Smell was believed to be connected with divine acceptance.
Women wore make-up around their eyes and bracelets around their arms, necks, and feet to ward off evil spirits.
They were given rouge for their cheeks, all shades of lipstick, eyeliner, and fingernail polish because they believed that beauty brought them closer to the gods.
And in a matter of months they would be led before a man most closely connected to the gods—the king himself.
Along with beautification the women were being schooled in court customs and royal etiquette.
What to say and how to say it.
Note the similar example of Joseph in the Egyptian prison, Gen. 39:20–21).
So in this “contest” Esther along with the 1000 other young women would appear before the king with whatever items she chose to augment the kin’s pleasure.
And she would lose her virginity to a pagan Gentile.
The young woman would return to the harem where she would then reside in a separate facility overseen by another Eunuch, “Shaashgaz”.
supervisor of the “concubines.
These women did not have the status of wives but were actually servants.
they were to provide the king with sexual pleasure and in some instances with children.
Some of the rabbinical additions tried to reconcile Esther’s character by having her claim she never violated the dietary kosher laws of the Hebrews.
In one verse they actually have her pray these words to God: “You know everything; and you know that I hate the pomp of the wicked, and the bed of the uncircumcised and any foreigner.”12
Since the king entertained a new virgin every night for several years, it was unlikely that he would ever remember one whom he had ravished days, months, or even years before.
In reality, the women in Ahasuerus’ contest were sentenced to a life of unfulfilled loneliness.
(This information also helps the reader later to understand Esther’s hesitation in approaching the king unbidden.)
Esther’s initial audience with the king took place about four years later.
It is likely that Ahasuerus consorted with over 1,000 virgins prior to his meeting with Esther
The Sacrifice
We see Esther sacrifice all that she is for this crown.
She Sacrifices her Jewishness.
She sacrifices her virginity.
She Sacrifices here family.
I con’t help but wonder how many young person has sacrificed themselves in the pursuit of another.
“if you love me you will… “.
How many professionals have kept their faith a secret so it didn’t get in the way of their climb up the corporate ladder.
I wonder how many Christians are living like Persians because they just want to get along with the Persians.
Or when in Rome
But what did it Get Esther.
A Crown - Yes. and she will be used by God to do great things.
but
Esther might have gained the title of Queen, but she didn’t gain a husband.
The king loved Esther more than all the women (Esther 2:17a), but he still loved the other women, too.
The text never says, “And after the crowning of Esther, the king ordered that his harem be released and his concubines, also.”
Not even close:
And when the virgins were gathered together the second time, then Mordecai was sitting at the gate (Esther 2:19).
Why was there a second time?
Esther had already won the crown—somebody stop the contest.
They did.
This second gathering of virgins had nothing to do with a contest.
It had everything to do with the king’s ever-expanding harem.
Esther would occupy the throne as queen, but she would not be the sole occupant of the king’s bed.
In fact, her role wouldn’t even allow her unhindered access to his bedroom … or his life.
Furthermore, Esther won the crown, but she didn’t win an honest relationship.
She had a secret.
In fact, it would be five years before she told her husband who she really was—and then it was almost too late.
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