Esther and Jesus

Bellow is my preach on Esther and Jesus (All views my own!). I originally wrote and preached this before deciding that it was really very urgent to write a series of posts on Esther. However it does serve to provide a good introduction to what will follow. 

The relevant passage is: 

Esther 7:1-6

Esther’s Plea

Now the king and Haman came to drink wine with Esther the queen. ² And the king said to Esther on the second day also ^[a]as they drank their wine at the banquet, “^(A)What is your petition, Queen Esther? It shall be granted you. And what is your request? ^(B)Even to half of the kingdom it shall be done.” ³ Then Queen Esther replied, “^(C)If I have found favor in your sight, O king, and if it pleases the king, let my life be given me as my petition, and my people as my request; ⁴ for ^(D)we have been sold, I and my people, to be destroyed, ^(E)to be killed and to be annihilated. Now if we had only been sold as slaves, men and women, I would have remained silent, for the ^[b]trouble would not be commensurate with the ^[c]annoyance to the king.” ⁵ Then King Ahasuerus ^[d]asked Queen Esther, “Who is he, and where is he, ^[e]who would presume to do thus?” ⁶ Esther said, “^(F)A foe and an enemy is this wicked Haman!” Then Haman became terrified before the king and queen.

Here's the audio:

Esther and Jesus

Here's the text:

Are we sitting comfortably? Then I’ll begin. Once upon a time there was a little girl called Anna. Anna was a philosopher, theologian, mathematician, lover of life and of people. Anna decided that everyone was born with bits of glass they got into the habit of slipping over their inner eye - the pieces of glasse said things like good bad nasty etc.

Dear Mr God this is Anna was given to me when I was 14 – it changed my life eternally. Thus is the power of narrative and story. As Merida says in Brave ‘legend’s teach us lessons’ about the world. Story is incredibly powerful for shaping the way we understand and live, it is the way we teach values and customs to children and a good childhood should be full of story.

And as adults we are surrounded by story. Story’s provide frameworks for us to understand the world. Many newspapers read much like fairy tales with the need to cast characters either as heros, victims, gods or monsters. Right now the most powerful god in our collective storytelling seems to be the market – but that’s for another preach!

So I want to talk about three things today, I want to talk about story, about coloured glass and about power.

When I first knew what I was preaching on I spent quite a bit of time thinking about Esther as a type of Jesus, but I didn’t feel I was getting very far and didn’t feel it was where the spirit was leading. We will look at it briefly, but I eventually realised that the topic I had been given was Ester and Jesus so, what I want to ask in this preach is what does it mean to read the book of Esther through Jesus tinted glass, which is actually not tinted at all but perfectly clear the only glasses through which we can see anywhere near clearly?

The danger if we do not read Esther through Jesus tinted glass is that we can get it very very wrong. You see story as well as being told can be miss-told. I love the fact that our holy scriptures come mostly in the form of story and that Jesus himself taught often in story, it gives it enormous power, but it also leaves it open to be horribly miss-told and Esther is definitely a book that has been horribly miss-told.

I was listening to a talk about women in leadership by David Westlake. He was going through the whole bible looking at evidence for women’s ability to lead (also known as right to experience full discipleship and humanity) when he got to Esther he asked the audience which Disney Princess Esther most reminded them of. He was making reference to the way this story is often romanticised. He then stated that Esther was like none of them since it was a story about sexual violence. In my head I thought – so quiet like sleeping beauty then?

You see where I would disagree with Anna, though it pains me, is that people are born with bits of glass, I am much more convinced about children being given them by adults and adults being given them by those in power and whoever is in power therefore gets to set the stories or narratives.

My feeling is that the last thing the world needs is another biblical interpretation from those in the powerful classes – this is why liberation theology is so powerful, we need interpretations of scripture from oppressed people if we are really going to discern its true narrative, the bible after all was not written for the powerful but predominantly by and for the oppressed.

I remember hearing the very great saint Desmund Tutu tell a joke about missionaries. He said when the missionaries came we had the land and they had the bibles, they said let’s pray, so we closed our eyes and when we opened them, they had the land and we had the bibles. But, he said it is a very dangerous thing to put a bible in the hands of those you are trying to oppress.

So even with our Jesus tinted spectacles on there are still a lot of different angles we could approach Esther from.  What I want to look at is power, how is power used and how does Jesus use power? Because the more I read Esther the more I thought this is a book about power.

Philipians 2:6-8

who, being in very nature^[a] God,
    did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage;
 rather, he made himself nothing
    by taking the very nature^[b] of a servant,
    being made in human likeness.
⁸And being found in appearance as a man,
    he humbled himself
    by becoming obedient to death –
        even death on a cross!

How does the world use power? I’ve recently come across a great word which is Kierarchy the term was coined by Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza as an elaboration of patriarchy, derived from the Greek words κύριος or kyrios (lord or master) and ἄρχω or archō (to lead, rule, govern). The term was coined in But She Said: Feminist Practices of Biblical Interpretation,

Basically it’s about living in a pyramid with the people at the top dictating everyone else’s experience and everyone fighting to have power over each other. Also in Kierarchy resources are not shared out equally and the people at the top who have control of the story telling, through newspapers, adverts and even children’s stories.

Often we are reminded about the need to understand the culture of a particular biblical text to properly interpret scripture and this is very true. But I’ve been massively struck recently however that sometimes it is the similarities between our experiences rather than the difference, that make biblical interpretation difficult. If you had a picture of a yellow triangle and a purple circle which would be easier to see against a yellow background? It is the kyerarchy around us that prevents us from accurately reading the bibles critique of such empire like attitudes to power.

In my world it also makes no sense to talk about sexual violence as if it were a thing of the past, as many biblical commentators seem to, and not something that is still endemic and epidemic in our society and also still justified and minimised. No I would suggest that in many ways Esther’s world is very very like our own.

Jesus was in very nature God but he never used that power in oppressive, self-promoting ways only ever in a life giving empowering way. His instructions to us are the same “The kings of the Gentiles lord it over them; and those who have authority over them are called ‘Benefactors.’ ²⁶ But it is not this way with you, ^(C)but the one who is the greatest among you must become like ^(D)the youngest, and the leader like the servant.

So with that preamble lets look at Esther 7 verse 1 to 6.

1 Now the king and Haman came to drink wine with Esther the queen. ² And the king said to Esther on the second day also ^[a]as they drank their wine at the banquet, “^(A)What is your petition, Queen Esther? It shall be granted you. And what is your request? ^(B)Even to half of the kingdom it shall be done.” 

Now there is in the story of Esther clearly a lot of paralleling. But it is important that we accurately read the intended meaning of these parallels and not superimpose our own presumptions upon the text. This point in the story Esther who has been selected as queen because her beauty pleased the king has invited the king to a banquet. Now it would be very hard not to see the parallel’s with Vashti who refused to go to the king’s banquet to display her beauty which displeased the king. 

Now if we read this through our kierarchical lenses we might read all this as a biblical criticism of Vashti, justification for hierarchy in marriage and see Vashti in competition with Esther. I believe the text is structured to encourage us to compare the two women but not in a competitive way. There are many commentators who suggest the text implies Vashti is summoned to come wearing only her crown – but either way she is being objectified and asked to go into a room of drunk and powerful men. The comparison to Esther is not about which is the better wife but about us realising that in patriarchy all women experience objectification and oppression whether they are the queen or an orphaned girl from a despised ethnic minority. Also a comparison between the women’s behaviour as opposed to the situation they are both in is pointless as we do not know what Esther would have done in Vashti’s situation because she never was. The passage does not ask us to decide whether Vashti or Esther is a better wife, nor does Jesus, the commentators do.

So what can we learn when we read this through our Jesus tinted spectacles? Well Jesus treatment of women clearly displayed an attitude that viewed women as people – whole people. Something Xerxe and his advisors fail miserably at. And Jesus is very clear that we are not meant to lord it over people.

Both Vashti and Esther where in positions within the kyerarchy that afforded them very little power and made them very vulnerable to sexual violence. Each within that constraint broke the rules and practiced creative subversive non-violent resistance. Exactly the kind of subversion Jesus taught and practiced. When Jesus taught his disciples to turn the other cheek he was not teaching them to be doormats but to declare their humanity in the midst of oppression. If you hit someone with your right hand on their left cheek, and they would have hit with their right hand because the other was for other things, you would slap them on with the back of your hand as though they were an inferior. By turning your right cheek to them you are saying I am human I am your equal fight me as such. Jesus was not only God he was the most human human there ever was and he never ever took any action that diminished the humanity of another not even when everyone around him was attempting to strip him of his humanity. The temptation when we are experiencing oppression is to despise  our oppressor – often to the point that we become what we hate. But our ^(W)struggle is not against ^[e](X)flesh and blood, but ^(Y)against the rulers, against the powers, against the ^(Z)world forces of this ^(AA)darkness, against the ^(AB)spiritual forces of wickedness in ^(AC)the heavenly places.³ 

Therefore we must not fight as the world fights but like Esther AND Vashti find creative subversive forms of protest that usher in the transformative power of Shalom, of God’s rule.

Esther is often described as a type of Jesus and I believe she is. But again we must view this type through The Jesus. We must also remember not to stretch metaphor. I read a few things on line about Esther as a type of Jesus. Some of them where nervous of casting Esther as a type of Jesus because she was a women, others were happy to but then fished around to ascribe types to the other characters and ended up ascribing God the father to Xerxes – now I don’t know about you but I’m not entirely comfortable with my God being equated with a genocidal megalomaniac who institutionalises sexual violence, and these sort of interpretations often lead people to reject parts of scripture as ‘text’s of Terror.’ It is for the here now.

And does God offer us things on a whim because he’s had some nice food and thinks we look pretty as Xerxes did? I think Jesus’ life displays a much greater eternal offer that is not dependent on anything we do or how we look, nor does he offer us an empire or half to rule but a people to serve. And this is exactly what Esther does

Then Queen Esther replied, “^(C)If I have found favor in your sight, O king, and if it pleases the king, let my life be given me as my petition, and my people as my request; 

She does not use her little bit of power to gain lordship for herself, because she could have, she could have asked for half the kingdom or even Hamman’s head on a plate, which with our gospel tinted lenses I think we are meant to note. However she, having risked her life to gain this leverage, intercedes for her people. This is what we are meant to note that just as Christ though in very nature God did not consider equality to be grasped became obedient to the point of death. Esther having been offered equality with Xerxes did not grasp it but risked her life for the salvation of her people. Enjoy the beauty of the picture without stretching it out of shape.  

⁴ for ^(D)we have been sold, I and my people, to be destroyed, ^(E)to be killed and to be annihilated. Now if we had only been sold as slaves, men and women, I would have remained silent, for the ^[b]trouble would not be commensurate with the ^[c]annoyance to the king.” 

A true theology of suffering is hard to come by. I can’t say I have the answer but I do think there are several identifiable pitfalls. One of them is that it is not Christian for oppressed groups to stand up and make a noise about their suffering. We should chin up grin and bear it. I think one of the reasons this narrative has deeply imbedded itself in our psyche is that for far too long the dominant expositions of scripture we’ve had have been from the point of view of the powerful. Esther seems to be saying here that slavery should not trouble the king, but we know it troubles Jesus – his very purpose was that he came for the liberation of captives. We also know from the story that the king should be fully aware of the coming genocide – he signed it off. Esther’s statement is not saying that slavery doesn’t matter someone with Jewish heritage could never believe that. She is using the example of slavery to press the desperation of the situation and to pander to the kings ego. In a kyierarchy the king quickly becomes forgetful of the position of the least. But in the kingdom of God they will be first.

And slavery and oppression always kills because they are instituted by violence. Violence and the threat of violence is how you keep a group subservient. Again often I hear people talking about this kind of oppression as though it where only something that happens a long way away or a long time ago. Wake up and smell the coffee. People are dying – in this country in there thousands as a direct result of oppression. If you live on the left hand side of Holloway road your life expectancy is ten years greater than on the right. You can argue the details with me but ultimately there is no explanation but injustice.

Jesus came that we might have life and have it in its fullness. Fullness of life is only possible when we live in a world where there is fullness of life for everyone. Our humanity is caught up in one another’s humanity. Apathy towards another’s suffering is one of the most deadening things to the spirit. You cannot feel joy if you do not know how to feel sorrow.

As Mordaci pointed out to Esther her position would not help her escape we cannot be free while our kin suffer.

⁵ Then King Ahasuerus ^[d]asked Queen Esther, “Who is he, and where is he, ^[e]who would presume to do thus?” 

King Ahasuerus can afford to be forgetful, he speaks from a place of privileged. The difficult thing about privilege is its invisible to those that have it. A Jew, even if they didn’t previously know Esther was a Jew would instantly know exactly what she meant and who she was talking about.

For the privileged, with their oppression filtering lenses and their entitlement complexes, fairytales and stories are either pure entertainments or the means of enforcing and maintaining their world view.

For the millions of women not being beaten by their partner 50 Shades of grey is just fiction. For all the theologians who have never experienced oppression and sexual violence Esther is a comment on another culture far removed from ours and we can afford to sanities and romanticise it through our interpretation. I can tell you now there are many young women in this borough for whom sexual violence and hareems are a daily reality, and there are young men struggling for their lives in heirrarchys trying to cling to a sense of humanity. And I can tell you that 50 shades is not fiction – it really happens to real people only without the happy ever after.

⁶ Esther said, “^(F)A foe and an enemy is this wicked Haman!” Then Haman became terrified before the king and queen.

Earlier I said that both Vashti and Esther had practiced non-violent resistance. I spent a while deciding whether this was the case for Esther – because Hamman comes to a pretty violent end. But the violence is the violence he meted out. Just to note that Esther’s latter request that the Jews be allowed to go on a killing spree I don’t think is an example of non-violent resistance. But here all she has done is expose the truth of who Hemman is.

You see the maintenance of kyerarchy is dependent on the maintenance of lies and deception, whereas the kingdom of God, the kingdom Jesus ushered in is established by the search for truth. It’s a dangerous and lonely place at the top – or even near the top. Mugabe would be a modern day example.

Who saw the Paralympic opening ceremony? Who saw what the athleats did with their lanyards? The tape that held there badge? There was a lot of speculation on twitter that they had deliberately hidden it. Atos the main sponsor of the paralympics has the government contract for assessing disability living allowance and many people have been documenting thousands of cases of people who have died with one of the main contributing factors being loss of DLA. Atos like Hamman went to an event for publicity it seriously backfired for Hamman. I’m prepaid to put my neck out and say I hope it seriously back fires for atos and am in full solidarity with the many protests planned over the next few weeks.

It is not only those with disability who are suffering at the moment, there has been a rise in homelessness and resulting death, there will be increasing segregation in access to healthcare, more children suffering and dying as a result of abuse and neglect and it is only going to get worse unless we have a significant radical and serious change in the story being told and lenses through which we see the world. Austerity is a lie there is more than enough money – it’s just in the wrong place. 

The political classes at the moment are telling a dangerous story and we must answer it with a better more powerful story.

I know its not very fashionable to be so critical, especially in such a basic way, but where would we be if people had never preached against slavery. There are some truly oppressive and evil things in our world today and if we read Esther through Jesus tinted lenses we will find a stark account of the evil in the world, realise that no one wins anything of value by playing the kierarchy game, and that just as Jesus did we must join the ranks of those who practice non-violence which puts you in total head on opposition of Kierarchy and empire like use of power because it calls you to be a servant of all. This may seem to make no sense but God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to shame the things which are strong.

There are different levels of privilege in this room but whatever privilege or power you do have learn the lessons of the book of Esther, don’t allow it to blind you like Xerxes or callous you like Hamman. Refuse to have power over anyone but use your power for; For the ushering in of God’s Kingom, for the liberation of people, for the intercession on behalf of the oppressed before the powerful, for the bringing about of God’s Shalom. We will never not be living in the clash between kyeriarchy and justice until Jesus returns. Just yesterday the EDL were out in Walthom forest facing collective resistance from united against fascism.

And though you may feel afraid as Esther did of the possible consequences of opposing colossal power, chose like she did to oppose oppression and your life will be all the richer and more human. God’s perfect love drives out all fear.