Immerse: Chronicles Full Volume - Flipbook - Page 158
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IMMERSE
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CHRONICLES
1:15–2:8
and Memucan—seven nobles of Persia and Media. They met with the
king regularly and held the highest positions in the empire.
“What must be done to Queen Vashti?” the king demanded. “What penalty does the law provide for a queen who refuses to obey the king’s orders,
properly sent through his eunuchs?”
Memucan answered the king and his nobles, “Queen Vashti has wronged
not only the king but also every noble and citizen throughout your empire.
Women everywhere will begin to despise their husbands when they learn
that Queen Vashti has refused to appear before the king. Before this day
is out, the wives of all the king’s nobles throughout Persia and Media will
hear what the queen did and will start treating their husbands the same
way. There will be no end to their contempt and anger.
“So if it please the king, we suggest that you issue a written decree, a
law of the Persians and Medes that cannot be revoked. It should order
that Queen Vashti be forever banished from the presence of King Xerxes,
and that the king should choose another queen more worthy than she.
When this decree is published throughout the king’s vast empire, husbands everywhere, whatever their rank, will receive proper respect from
their wives!”
The king and his nobles thought this made good sense, so he followed
Memucan’s counsel. He sent letters to all parts of the empire, to each province in its own script and language, proclaiming that every man should be
the ruler of his own home and should say whatever he pleases.
But after Xerxes’ anger had subsided, he began thinking about Vashti and
what she had done and the decree he had made. So his personal attendants
suggested, “Let us search the empire to find beautiful young virgins for the
king. Let the king appoint agents in each province to bring these beautiful young women into the royal harem at the fortress of Susa. Hegai, the
king’s eunuch in charge of the harem, will see that they are all given beauty
treatments. After that, the young woman who most pleases the king will be
made queen instead of Vashti.” This advice was very appealing to the king,
so he put the plan into effect.
At that time there was a Jewish man in the fortress of Susa whose name
was Mordecai son of Jair. He was from the tribe of Benjamin and was a
descendant of Kish and Shimei. His family had been among those who,
with King Jehoiachin of Judah, had been exiled from Jerusalem to Bab
ylon by King Nebuchadnezzar. This man had a very beautiful and lovely
young cousin, Hadassah, who was also called Esther. When her father and
mother died, Mordecai adopted her into his family and raised her as his
own daughter.
As a result of the king’s decree, Esther, along with many other young
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