THE STORY OF ESTHER
On March 5, 2022, from Los Angeles, USA, Professor Iván Darío Moreno held a virtual Conference that was attended by more than 150 people from Europe and the Americas.
The topic presented was the Book of Esther, which captivated the audience’s attention. The professor delivered a comprehensive analysis of this profound biblical narrative, exploring its significance through three distinct lenses: geographical, historical, and cultural.
From the geographical aspect, we know that the exiled Jews in Babylon are divided into two main groups. Some returned to Jerusalem after seventy years of captivity, and the other part stayed in Babylon; They even settled in other eastern regions such as the city of Susa, capital of the Persian province of Elam. This last one is the case of the Jewish characters of the Biblical book of Esther. The civilization of Elam was in what we know today as the region between Iran and Iraq.
Historically, the existence of the characters mentioned in the book of Esther cannot be scientifically confirmed. The reason is that there is insufficient evidence to support its historical reality.
It is true that there are different opinions in relation to the mentioned biblical characters; some experts say that Ahasuerus may be the same Xerxes I of whom there are records and whose father was King Darius. As for the characters of Esther, Vashti, Haman or Mordecai, no historical evidence has been found to support their existence outside the biblical context.
The name Mordecai was common at the time and could have been associated with the Mesopotamian deity Marduk, which could explain its presence in biblical history.
Culturally, we realize that the Jews acquired and assimilated many features of Babylonian culture.
In the group of Jews who returned to Jerusalem, they had laws concerning marriage that were very strict, such as a strict prohibition against marrying foreigners.
In contrast, the Jews who spread to the East had interactions with other cultures and intermarried with people of different ethnic and cultural origins. Thus, we have Esther, a Jew who marries a foreigner, King Ahasuerus.
Something that can be surprising for us is to understand that, in that historical period, women were a figure, as a property of the man and that marriages were carried out with the purpose of strengthening alliances. Thus, the kings used to have a harem of women with which they demonstrated their power, opulence and authority. In charge of the harem of royal concubines were the Eunuchs who were men, usually not heterosexual, who were eventually castrated. Eunuchs could become quite influential in affairs of state. The kings even asked them for administrative advice and these eunuchs also served as messengers and informants between people of power.
In addition, it was explained that the present Judaism has changed certain customs, since it refers to a community of people who are born of Jewish parents and are more liberal, since, within this community, we find individuals who can choose to follow or not the Judaic religious faith, as well as participating or not in specific festivities and rituals. Judaism has become a cultural group that goes beyond the purely religious, as is the case with Catholicism and other cultural expressions.
