Reading Notes: Week 3, Part B (Esther)
This reading was solely focused on the three readings about Esther, one of my all-time favorite women in the Bible. I love the whole story of Esther, all she stands for and all of the lessons that can be taken from it. 
Photo of a crown
(Taken by Ashton Mullins on Unsplash)
Esther was a young and pretty Jewish girl, who one day found herself to be the queen of Persia, serving alongside King Ahasuerus. There came a time when the king wished to replace the former queen, Vashti, because she was causing a lot of anger in the palace. King Ahasuerus commanded that his servants gather up all of the fair young virgins in the kingdom, that he may find one of them to be a suitable queen for his kingdom. Esther had an uncle, Mordecai, who pushed her to go to the castle to be the queen, even though she was a Jew, and Jews were not highly thought of in this town. Mordecai suggested to her to keep her Jewish identity a secret as to not set off any alarms within the castle, or give her any chance of not making it to be queen. The king loved Esther more than any of the other women that were there, and he made her queen. After this decision, the king decided to throw a huge feast in her honor, where Mordecai then charged her to finally tell him about her background, which would be made complicated because of King Ahasuerus's evil servant Haman. Haman was given free reign over the Jews, to do what he wanted with them. He issued a decree that all of the Jews in the land were to be killed – all men, women, and children. When word of this got to Esther, Mordecai commended her to bring up the King that she was a Jew and to see what he would do, hopefully save all of the Jews. Esther held very high favor in the King's sight and knew it would come to fruition. Before the decision was made by the king and before the final feast, Haman demanded that Mordecai was to be hung by the gallows outside of the palace. The final banquet was for Esther to request anything to the king, and that request would be granted. Esther then tells King Ahasuerus Haman's plan to kill the Jews, which angered the King to the point where Haman was afraid to be in both of their presences. King Ahasuerus then demanded for Haman to be hung from the gallows in which he requested Mordecai to be hung from. That day, Esther was given control over Haman's house, and King Ahasuerus gave Mordecai the ring that originally was given to Haman. King Ahasuerus then reversed the decree for all Jews to be killed, because Esther had found such favor in the eyes of the King.
A very, very rough re-telling of the story of Esther, but such a simplified way to show how much love, grace and understanding is shown throughout the events that occurred.
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