Summary of the biblical Book of Esther; cf. already under alpha 1483 and epsilon 3121.
[1] The name of the king is in the Hebrew אֲחַשְׁוֵרוֹשׁ ʾaḥašwerōš (Latin Ahasuerus), which seems to reflect a transliteration of Persian Kshaiarsha. This equates to the Greek *Ce/rchs, but no historical source links Esther with that king (Xerxes I, reigned 486-465: xi 54). Rather, the Greek sources, and especially Josephus (Jewish Antiquities 11.198ff.) show the name Artaxerxes; therefore an alternative identification with Xerxes' immediate successor, Artaxerxes I Makrocheir (reigned 465-424), has been suggested.
[2] The Greek verb diafe/rw normally denotes a "difference" more than a relation between things or persons, though a later use (C3-C4 A.D.) is attested with the sense of "belonging to" or "appertaining to"; hence oi( diafe/rontes is sometimes used to mean "relatives" or "kinsfolk".
[3] See mu 190. Both Esther and Mordechai could be names of Babylonian origin (Ishtar and Marduch; and as to Esther, a relationship is also possible with Persian stareh, "star").
[4] Mordechai raises the orphaned Esther and loves her as a father in the Biblical account. The post-Christian Jewish tradition makes Esther’s husband out of him, saying that he would become the tutor of the girl, with the intention of marrying her.
[5] This remark especially relates to Mordechai, whose official function at the king’s court is alluded to at Esther 2.19ff.
[6] The account offered by the Suda is confused and seems to be based on other (perhaps inaccurate) summaries, since it seems to combine two different episodes of the story as it appears in the Book of Esther. What is said about the edict does not correspond with any evidence in the text, where the king orders all of his subjects to perform a proskynesis not to "his own image" but to his wicked minister Haman (cf. Esther 3.1). The refusal expressed by Mordechai (which could rest upon ethnic pride more than religious reasons, according to some interpretations; yet the Book of Daniel 1.8, 3 relates such positions to Jewish worship) and Haman’s consequent wrath are the rationale behind the royal edict decreeing death for the whole Jewish people, accused of not following Persians rules and laws. Also cf. (besides Josephus) the accounts by Athanasius, Synopsis script. sacr. (28,368.9ff. Migne); George the Monk, Chronicon 272.2ff.; Hippolytus Comm. in Danielem 3.20.5 and the allusion in Origen, Exhortatio ad martyrium 33.
[7] *)anakwxh\ is a rather rare word, with the basic meaning of "cessation", or even "hindrance" (cf. alpha 1913, alpha 1914); but for the sense given by the Suda cf. Hesychius alpha4397-4398, explaining the word (in Thucydides 1.40.4) with the gloss a)na/pausis and the participle a)nakwxh/santes (Herodotus 6.116) as a)naxwrh/santes, h)\ metew/rws kate/xontes ta\s nau=s "retiring, or keeping the ships on the high sea".
[8] Another obscure detail, since the edict fixes the date for the beginning of Jewish people’s extermination on the "fourteenth day of the twelfth month" (Adar according to the Jewish calendar). One wonders whether a mistake has been made here, starting from confusion between "fourteen" and "forty".
[9] The prayer of the Jews is inserted by the Vetus Latina after Esther 3.15.
[10] The expression ei)s th\n basi/leion au)lh\n (cf. Esther 2.19 ff.) seems to refer to Mordechai’s official duties, since "the king’s gate" denotes (even in Aramaic documents and in the Book of Daniel) the royal chancelry.
[11] This is the episode "combined" in the summary or in its sources with the main story of the edict against the Jews (cf. note 6), and actually preceding this one in the Book of Esther. At 2.19 ff. Mordechai, while "at the king’s gate", discovers the plot against the king organized by two of his eunuchs. It is not Mordechai who reveals to the king the details of the conspiracy, but Esther, after her uncle has asked for her help.
[12] There is still a relationship between the discovering of this plot and the story of Haman’s edict. While he is being convinced by Esther not to carry out the extermination of the Jews, the king will remember Mordechai’s fidelity by reading about the episode in the chronicles of his reign and reward him with honors; Haman will be hanged on the very gallows he had prepared for the hated Mordechai.