Esther: A Better Eve
For the last couple of weeks, we’ve looked at the problem of Eve speaking to her husband and giving him the fruit from the forbidden tree.
Eve failed to listen to the command of God (wisdom) and instead listened to the deception of the serpent. Eve failed to be an ‘ezer (sustainer) for her husband.
But, Eve’s failure is not every woman’s failure; a woman is not destined to choose folly instead of wisdom! In this blog series we’ve seen how both Sarah (Abraham’s wife) and Abigail (David’s future wife) both spoke wisdom to their husbands and were connected to God’s own plan and words.
The authors of the biblical narratives show Sarah and Abigail as both behaving in the way God intended them to act (you can read about Sarah here, and Abigail here). And, pointedly, those women were acting in wisdom in contrast to the men in the story!
Now, I don’t want to belabor the point, but there are several examples other women in the Old Testament who prove to be a Better Eve and save their husbands, or numerous men, or even the whole nation of Israel.
But today, we’ll look at a final woman as just one more example of women behaving according to God’s word and His plan, and I think reiterating my point with this last example will help us to be certain that women aren’t destined to fail like Eve did.
Esther. A book of the Bible that is chockfull of allusions to the Garden of Eden and the narrative that occurred in Genesis 1-3.
It’s important that we see this contextual set up and the connections back to the Garden because the stories are meant to be understood together. And when we see the analogy is intentional, we can confidently compare and contrast Eve and Esther and discover why they are linked.
Patterns from Genesis that are repeated in Esther
The book of Esther starts out with the celebration of a King inside his garden (1:5), where his people are ‘watered’ (וְהַשְׁקוֹת) in vessels of gold (1:7), just as the garden was ‘watered’ (לְהַשְׁקוֹת) from both the mists and the rivers in Eden (Gen 2:6,10). There, his people were given an edict to eat and drink their fill “without compulsion” – they are free to eat and drink as much as they’d like (1:7; cf Gen. 2:16, where they were commanded to eat freely)!
This garden party is given great detail to its rich decoration (in vs.6, just like Eden’s garden, the fine ornaments are analogous to the tabernacle’s beautification, Gen 2:10-14 ). Then, the feast for those in the palace last for seven days (Gen 2:1).
Now on the seventh day, the author of the book zooms in to take a closer look at what happened during this feast. The king gives his exceptionally beautiful queen a command (1:11), which she refuses to obey (1:12), and she is punished and never allowed to come before the king’s face again (1:19; I translate this part literally, “come to the face of the king,” because they are the same words used in Gen. 3:8 when both Adam and Eve hide from God’s face (i.e. His presence) and are then exiled from God’s presence in the judgment, 3:23-24)[1].
By bringing up these high points of repeated patterns from the Garden of Eden, I am highlighting for the reader of Esther that it is not a coincidence that all of these aspects mirror the first stories of the Old Testament. The author of Esther is consciously setting up the narrative to look like Eden.
We’ll look at further evidence of the connection between Genesis 1-3 and the Book of Esther:
Let’s go to chapter 2 of Esther, where we see that she is the adopted daughter of her cousin Mordecai. She is beautiful to look at – just like the trees in the garden, and like Joseph, Sarah, Rebekah, Rachel, and Abigail. I will again mention in this blog series that as soon as you see a beautiful person come into the picture of a biblical narrative, you know that a time of testing is coming!
Then, Mordecai himself is pictured like God walking in the garden (מִתְהַלֵּךְ; Gen 3:8 and Es 2:11), and as a royal messianic figure (Es 6:11, 8:15). So then, the reader understands the importance of Mordecai pictured as father to Esther in that Esther is explicitly said to have always listened to the words of Mordecai (2:20). This is a woman who has always and continues to obey the instruction of the father (contrary to Eve, who disobeyed the Father; and in the immediate context, contrary to Vashti who has disobeyed a command).
Now, let’s look at how Esther uses her words in the remainder of the narrative and how the men respond.
We look first at the interaction between Mordecai and Esther in chapter 4. They have both heard the news of how Haman has convinced the king to let him annihilate the Jews. And Modecai commands Esther to go and plead with the king on behalf of her people (4:8).
Remember, Esther has been shown as one who obeys her father (Mordecai, adopted father). What does she do? She responds saying that she could be killed for going to the king without being called to him first. And Mordecai says: If you keep silent at this time, relief and deliverance will rise for the Jews from another place, but you and your father’s house will perish (4:14).
Whether Esther speaks or not is connected to deliverance or to death. A woman’s words will mean life or death. Will Esther be better than Eve? Will her words lead to life?
Here, we see now that Esther tells Mordecai to do something: “Go and gather the Jews, and hold a fast on my behalf…for three days…” (4:16). And the writer of the narrative says that “Mordecai then went away and did everything that Esther commanded him.” (4:17)
She obeys his command, and he obeys her command. She listens to him and he listens to her.
Now, Esther comes before the king and she finds favor in his sight[2] He grants her request to come to a feast for himself and Haman. During this feast, she again requests for the king and Haman to come back again the second day and she will make her request.
Essential events come between these two feasts, such as the honoring of Mordecai and his enemy’s (Haman’s) laying a plot for him – the messianic figure being plotted against by his enemy. But his enemy does not overcome him! But, this blog is intended to focus on Esther’s words bringing life and deliverance to the people of Israel (just as Abigail’s words brought life to both her husband’s household and to David and his men, as we saw last time.).
In the narrative of the second feast, chapter 7, we see again the presence of food and drinking, and the palace garden returns to the scene, with a man and his wife along with the enemy of God’s people. All Genesis 2 and 3 patterns! And the woman – Esther – intercedes on behalf of her people with her words. She begs for favor and for the life of herself and her people. And, she names her enemy and calls him wicked.
Esther knows who her enemy is. She doesn’t hide from him or try to appease him or talk to Haman at all, but risks her own life, following the command of her father, and asks the king to save them. A better Eve, indeed!
In chapter 8, we find that Haman’s death wasn’t enough to save Esther’s people. Therefore she speaks to the king again (8:10). She falls at the king’s feet, weeping, and pleads for the king to avert the plan that the enemy had planned against the Jews.
The writer elaborates on Esther’s words of request in 8:5-6. And the king responds with approval and gives them permission to write a decree and seal it with the king’s signet[3]. Through the creation and enaction of that decree, the Jews were able to fight against and conquer their enemies, even in the land of their exile. This is command of God to His people, starting in Genesis 1 – subdue and conquer the land (cf Deut. 31, Josh. 6).
By Esther’s words and actions of intercession for her people, they were saved and were given the power to fight their enemies! This is a reversal of the Garden Fall!
In conclusion I want to point out two things:
First, Esther is in a long line of women who use their words for life and salvation and the furthering of God’s plan. We saw that in Sarah and in Abigail. But there are many women in the Old Testament that use their words for life, crushing the idea that women should not speak or instruct men.[4]
Second, Mordecai and Esther are a prime example of a man and woman working together in humility. Though he is like a father to her, there is no power play between them. She listens to him and does what he says, and he listened to her and did what she said. The result of their mutual partnership was LIFE for God’s people.
If men and women could work together today in God’s household, what would that mutual partnership produce for God’s people?
NOTES
[1] The pagan king and his pagan council is not necessarily pictured as doing the right thing here with Vashti. This blog doesn’t have room to deal with that section of narrative, but I will suggest to you that the author is setting up the king as an easily angered man with whom you must tread carefully, as we will see later in the story of Esther. She risks her life by approaching him without him sending for her, and then in giving her bold words to him about saving her people. Additionally, I think there are some connections here between the drunk and angry king and the offense of Nabal to David, after which Nabal feasts and is drunk with the men of his home in 1 Sam. 25. After which his wife approaches him with news that she has done what is contra a declaration he had previously made (for Abigail, it was intervening and feeding David and his men; for Esther, it was feeding the king dinner, and then her plea to save the people that the king had already condemned to die).
Finally, the banishment of Vashti and the decree to all women is described: “and good (תוֹב) [were] the words in the eyes of the king.” If you’ve been following this blog series, you know that a person deciding what’s good in their own eyes has been a sign of doing something that’s opposite of what God sees as good (תוֹב).
[2] Seeing and sight continues to be a major theme throughout all of the Old & New Testaments. Always keep track of what is being seen!
[3] Again here, just like at the beginning of the book, the king gives a lot of weight to others. But the king giving the power of the words of the decree to Esther and Mordecai is reminiscent of another beautiful person that is elevated to second in command, and given the power to save people from death – Joseph, in Egypt!
[4] Miriam, Zipporah, Rahab, Deborah, Huldah, Abigail, Sarah, Hannah, just to name a few!
Author: Mary Busby
Mary has an MA in Professional Counseling (Liberty University), a BA in Linguistics (University of Florida), and is currently studying for a Master’s certificate in Biblical Hebrew.