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Matthew Henry |
E S T H E R
CHAP. II.
Two things are recorded in this chapter, which were working towards the
deliverance of the Jews from Haman’s conspiracy:–
I. The advancement of Esther to be queen instead of Vashti. Many others
were candidates for the honour
(ver. 1-4);
but Esther, an orphan, a captive-Jewess
(ver. 5-7),
recommended herself to the king’s chamberlain first
and then to the king
(ver. 12-17),
who made her queen,
II. The good service that Mordecai did to the king in discovering a
plot against his life,
| Esther’s Advancement; Esther Chosen Queen. | B. C. 514. |
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1 After these things, when the wrath of king Ahasuerus was
appeased, he remembered Vashti, and what she had done, and what
was decreed against her.
2 Then said the king’s servants that ministered unto him, Let
there be fair young virgins sought for the king:
3 And let the king appoint officers in all the provinces of his
kingdom, that they may gather together all the fair young virgins
unto Shushan the palace, to the house of the women, unto the
custody of Hege the king’s chamberlain, keeper of the women; and
let their things for purification be given them:
4 And let the maiden which pleaseth the king be queen instead
of Vashti. And the thing pleased the king; and he did so.
5 Now in Shushan the palace there was a certain Jew, whose
name was Mordecai, the son of Jair, the son of Shimei, the son
of Kish, a Benjamite;
6 Who had been carried away from Jerusalem with the captivity
which had been carried away with Jeconiah king of Judah, whom
Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon had carried away.
7 And he brought up Hadassah, that is, Esther, his uncle’s
daughter: for she had neither father nor mother, and the maid
was fair and beautiful; whom Mordecai, when her father and
mother were dead, took for his own daughter.
8 So it came to pass, when the king’s commandment and his
decree was heard, and when many maidens were gathered together
unto Shushan the palace, to the custody of Hegai, that Esther was
brought also unto the king’s house, to the custody of Hegai,
keeper of the women.
9 And the maiden pleased him, and she obtained kindness of him;
and he speedily gave her her things for purification, with such
things as belonged to her, and seven maidens, which were meet
to be given her, out of the king’s house: and he preferred her
and her maids unto the best place of the house of the women.
10 Esther had not showed her people nor her kindred: for
Mordecai had charged her that she should not show it.
11 And Mordecai walked every day before the court of the
women’s house, to know how Esther did, and what should become of
her.
12 Now when every maid’s turn was come to go in to king
Ahasuerus, after that she had been twelve months, according to
the manner of the women, (for so were the days of their
purifications accomplished, to wit, six months with oil of
myrrh, and six months with sweet odours, and with other things
for the purifying of the women;)
13 Then thus came every maiden unto the king; whatsoever she
desired was given her to go with her out of the house of the
women unto the king’s house.
14 In the evening she went, and on the morrow she returned into
the second house of the women, to the custody of Shaashgaz, the
king’s chamberlain, which kept the concubines: she came in unto
the king no more, except the king delighted in her, and that she
were called by name.
15 Now when the turn of Esther, the daughter of Abihail the
uncle of Mordecai, who had taken her for his daughter, was come
to go in unto the king, she required nothing but what Hegai the
king’s chamberlain, the keeper of the women, appointed. And
Esther obtained favour in the sight of all them that looked upon
her.
16 So Esther was taken unto king Ahasuerus into his house royal
in the tenth month, which is the month Tebeth, in the seventh
year of his reign.
17 And the king loved Esther above all the women, and she
obtained grace and favour in his sight more than all the virgins;
so that he set the royal crown upon her head, and made her queen
instead of Vashti.
18 Then the king made a great feast unto all his princes and
his servants, even Esther’s feast; and he made a release to the
provinces, and gave gifts, according to the state of the king.
19 And when the virgins were gathered together the second time,
then Mordecai sat in the king’s gate.
20 Esther had not yet showed her kindred nor her people; as
Mordecai had charged her: for Esther did the commandment of
Mordecai, like as when she was brought up with him.
How God put down one that was high and mighty from her seat we read in
the chapter before, and are now to be told how he exalted one of low
degree, as the virgin Mary observes in her song
and Hannah before her,
Vashti being humbled for her height, Esther is advanced for her
humility. Observe,
I. The extravagant course that was taken to please the king with
another wife instead of Vashti. Josephus says that when his anger was
over he was exceedingly grieved that the matter was carried so far, and
would have been reconciled to Vashti but that, by the constitution of
the government, the judgment was irrevocable–that therefore, to make
him forget her, they contrived how to entertain him first with a great
variety of concubines, and then to fix him to the most agreeable of
them all for a wife instead of Vashti. The marriages of princes are
commonly made by policy and interest, for the enlarging of their
dominions and the strengthening of their alliances; but this must be
made partly by the agreeableness of the person to the king’s fancy,
whether she was rich or poor, noble or ignoble. What pains were taken
to humour the king! As if his power and wealth were given him for no
other end than that he might have all the delights of the sense wound
up to the height of pleasurableness, and exquisitely refined, though at
the best they are but dross and dregs in comparison with divine and
spiritual pleasures.
1. All the provinces of his kingdom must be searched for fair young
virgins, and officers appointed to choose them,
v. 3.
2. A house (a seraglio) was prepared on purpose for them, and a person
appointed to have the charge of them, to see that they were well
provided for.
3. No less than twelve months was allowed them for their purification,
some of them at least who were brought out of the country, that they
might be very clean, and perfumed,
Even those who were the masterpieces of nature must yet have all this
help from art to recommend them to a vain and carnal mind.
4. After the king had once taken them to his bed, they were made
recluses ever after, except the king pleased at any time to send for
them
(v. 14);
they were looked upon as secondary wives, were maintained by the king
accordingly, and might not marry. We may see, by this instance, to what
absurd practices those came who were destitute of divine revelation,
and who, as a punishment for their idolatry, were given up to vile
affections. Having broken through that law of creation which resulted
from God’s making man, they broke through another law, which was
founded upon his making one man and one woman. See what need there was
of the gospel of Christ to purify men from the lusts of the flesh and
to reduce them to the original institution. Those that have learned
Christ will think it a shame even to speak of such things as
these which were done of them, not only in secret, but
avowedly,
II. The overruling providence of God thus bringing Esther to be queen.
Had she been recommended to Ahasuerus for a wife, he would have
rejected the motion with disdain; but when she came in her turn, after
several others, and it was found that though many of them were
ingenious and discreet, graceful and agreeable, yet Esther excelled
them all, way was made for her, even by her rivals, into the king’s
affections and the honours consequent thereupon. It is certain, as
bishop Patrick says, that those who suggest that she committed a great
sin to come at this dignity do not consider the custom of those times
and countries. Every one that the king took to his bed was married to
him, and was his wife of a lower rank, as Hagar was Abraham’s; so that,
if Esther had not been made queen, the sons of Jacob need not say that
he dealt with their sister as with a harlot. Concerning Esther
we must observe,
1. Her original and character.
(1.) She was one of the children of the captivity, a Jewess and
a sharer with her people in their bondage. Daniel and his fellows were
advanced in the land where they were captives; for they were of those
whom God sent thither for their good,
Jer. xxiv. 5.
(2.) She was an orphan; her father and mother were both dead
(v. 7),
but, when they had forsaken here, then the Lord took her up,
When those whose unhappiness it is to be thus deprived of their parents
in their childhood yet afterwards come to be eminently pious and
prosperous, we ought to take notice of it to the glory of that God, and
his grace and providence, who has taken it among the titles of his
honour to be a Father of the fatherless.
(3.) She was a beauty, fair of form, good of countenance; so it
is in the margin,
v. 7.
Her wisdom and virtue were her greatest beauty, but it is an advantage
to be a diamond to be well set.
(4.) Mordecai, her cousin-german, was her guardian, brought her up,
and took her for his own daughter. The LXX. says that he designed
to make her his wife; if that were so, he was to be praised that he
opposed not her better preferment. Let God be acknowledged in raising
up friends for the fatherless and motherless; let it be an
encouragement to that pious instance of charity that many who have
taken care of the education of orphans have lived to see the good fruit
of their care and pains, abundantly to their comfort. Dr. Lightfoot
thinks that this Mordecai is the same with that mentioned in
who went up to Jerusalem with the first, and helped forward the
settlement of his people until the building of the temple was stopped,
and then went back to the Persian court, to see what service he could
do them there. Mordecai being Esther’s guardian or pro-parent, we are
told,
[1.] How tender he was of her, as if she had been his own child
(v. 11):
he walked before her door every day, to know how she did, and what
interest she had. Let those whose relations are thus cast upon them by
divine Providence be thus kindly affectioned to them and solicitous for
them.
[2.] How respectful she was to him. Though in relation she was his
equal, yet, being in age and dependence his inferior, she honoured him
as her father–did his commandment,
v. 20.
This is an example to orphans; if they fall into the hands of those who
love them and take care of them, let them make suitable returns of duty
and affection. The less obliged their guardians were in duty to provide
for them the more obliged they are in gratitude to honour and obey
their guardians. Here is an instance of Esther’s obsequiousness t
Mordecai, that she did not show her people of her kindred,
because Mordecai had charged her that she should not,
He did not bid her deny her country, nor tell a lie to conceal her
parentage; if he had told her to do so, she must not have done it. But
he only told her not to proclaim her country. All truths are not to be
spoken at all times, though an untruth is not to be spoken at any time.
She being born in Shushan, and her parents being dead, all took her to
be of Persian extraction, and she was not bound to undeceive them.
2. Her preferment. Who would have thought that a Jewess, a captive, and
orphan, was born to be a queen, an empress! Yet so it proved.
Providence sometimes raiseth up the poor out of the dust, to set
them among princes,
1 Sam. ii. 8.
(1.) The king’s chamberlain honoured her
(v. 9),
and was ready to serve her. Wisdom and virtue will gain respect. Those
that make sure of God’s favour shall find favour with man too as far as
it is good for them. All that looked upon Esther admired her
(v. 15)
and concluded that she was the lady that would win the prize, and she
did win it.
(2.) The king himself fell in love with her. She was not solicitous, as
the rest of the maidens were, to set herself off with artificial
beauty; she required nothing but just what was appointed
for her
(v. 15)
and yet she was most acceptable. The more natural beauty is the more
agreeable. The king loved Esther above all the women,
v. 17.
Now he needed not to make any further trials, or take time to
deliberate; he is soon determined to set the royal crown upon her
head, and make her queen,
v. 17.
This was done in his seventh year
(v. 16)
and Vashti was divorced in his third year
(ch. i. 3);
so that he was four years without a queen. Notice is taken,
[1.] Of the honours the king put upon Esther. He graced the solemnity
of her coronation with a royal feast
(v. 18),
at which perhaps Esther, in compliance with the king, made a public
appearance, which Vashti had refused to do, that she might have the
praise of obedience in the same instance in which the other incurred
the blot of disobedience. He also granted a release to the
provinces, either a remittance of the taxes in arrear or an act of
grace for criminals; as Pilate, at the feast, released a prisoner. This
was to add t the joy.
[2.] Of the deference Esther continued to pay to her former guardian.
She still did the commandment of Mordecai, as when she was brought
up with him,
v. 20.
Mordecai say in the king’s gate; that was the height of his
preferment: he was one of the porters or door-keepers of the court.
Whether he had this place before, or whether Esther obtained it for
him, we are not told; but there he sat contentedly, and aimed no
higher; and yet Esther who was advanced to the throne was observant of
him. This was an evidence of a humble and grateful disposition, that
she had a sense of his former kindnesses and his continued wisdom. It
is a great ornament to those that are advanced, and much to their
praise, to remember their benefactors, to retain the impressions of
their good education, to be diffident of themselves, willing to take
advice, and thankful for it.
| Mordecai’s Discovery of a Plot. | B. C. 510. |
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21 In those days, while Mordecai sat in the king’s gate, two of
the king’s chamberlains, Bigthan and Teresh, of those which kept
the door, were wroth, and sought to lay hand on the king
Ahasuerus.
22 And the thing was known to Mordecai, who told it unto
Esther the queen; and Esther certified the king thereof in
Mordecai’s name.
23 And when inquisition was made of the matter, it was found
out; therefore they were both hanged on a tree: and it was
written in the book of the chronicles before the king.
This good service which Mordecai did to the government, in discovering
a plot against the life of the king, is here recorded, because the
mention of it will again occur to his advantage. No step is yet taken
towards Haman’s design of the Jews’ destruction, but several steps are
taken towards God’s design of their deliverance, and this for one. God
now gives Mordecai an opportunity of doing the king a good turn, that
he might have the fairer opportunity afterwards of doing the Jews a
good turn.
1. A design was laid against the king by two of his own servants, who
sought to lay hands on him, not only to make him a prisoner, but
to take away his life,
Probably they resented some affront which they thought he had given
them, or some injury which he had done them. Who would be great, to be
so much the object of envy? Who would be arbitrary, to be so much the
object of ill-will? Princes, above any mortals, have their souls
continually in their hands, and often go down slain to the pit,
especially those who caused terror in the land of the living.
2. Mordecai got notice of their treason, and, by Esther’s means,
discovered it to the king, hereby confirming her in and recommending
himself to the king’s favour. How he came to the knowledge of it does
not appear. Whether he overheard their discourse, or whether they
offered to draw him in with them, so it was that the thing was
known to him. This ought to be a warning against all traitorous and
seditious practices: though men presume upon secresy, a bird of the
air shall carry the voice. Mordecai, as soon as he knew it, caused
it to be made known to the king, which ought to be an instruction and
example to all that would be found good subjects not to conceal any bad
design they know of against the prince or the public peace, for it is
making a confederacy with public enemies.
3. The traitors were hanged, as they deserved, but not till their
treason was, upon search, fully proved against them
(v. 23),
and the whole matter was recorded in the king’s journals, with a
particular remark that Mordecai was the man who discovered the treason.
He was not rewarded presently, but a book of remembrance was written.
Thus with respect to those who serve Christ, though their recompence is
adjourned till the resurrection of the just, yet an account is kept of
their work of faith and labour of love, which God is not
unrighteous to forget,
Heb. vi. 10.
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