Editorial introduction: Esther as Christian scripture

1025222 research-article2021 RAE0010.1177/00346373211025222Review & ExpositorBiddle Editorial Review and Expositor 2021, Vol. 118(2) 137–139 Editorial introduction: Esther © The Author(s) 2021 Article reuse guidelines: as Christian scripture sagepub.com/journals-permissions DOI: 10.1177/00346373211025222 https://doi.org/10.1177/00346373211025222 journals.sagepub.com/home/rae Mark E. Biddle Sophia Theological Seminary, USA Arguably, Esther ranks among the most enigmatic and, therefore, most neglected books in the Bible. As contributors to this issue of Review & Expositor will explore in greater detail, the book refers to neither Israel’s covenant/Torah nor its salvation-history/election traditions; in fact, in its Hebrew version, Esther does not mention God at all. It offers an account of events that scholars find difficult to reconcile with the historical record and that, frankly, strain the credulity of its reader (a 75 foot gallows!). The search for theological themes or noble behaviors worth emulating encoun- ters an imbalanced matrix of gender relations and a plot that seems to endorse a dangerous notion of “preemptive revenge” that has, over the centuries, perversely fueled anti-Semitism. Luther despised the book while, long before him, despite its popularity as the textual foundation for Purim, even the early rabbis debated its canonical status. To date, it is the only biblical book not attested among the Qumran manuscripts. Esther’s peculiarity has had the practical effect of alienating it from any significant role in the life of the church. The church claims canonical status for Esther but relegates it functionally to the church’s curio cabinet. Contributors to this issue of Review & Expositor grapple with a number of the elements involved in the question of how Esther can func- tion as canon, that is, as authoritative scripture in the ongoing life of the church and of individual believers. LeAnn Snow Flesher’s “Word About” contribution, “Called for such a time as this,” confronts concerns about Esther’s contemporary relevance immediately and directly. Focusing on Mordecai’s challenge to Esther to intervene against Haman’s planned genocide, Snow Flesher hears Mordecai’s call to act “in such a time as this” as a call that echoes through time down to today and today’s dangers. Mark E. Biddle’s article, “Christian interpretation of Esther before the Reformation,” begins the thematic section of this issue with the recognition that contemporary Esther scholarship typically restricts itself to the history of Esther interpretation that starts in the Reformation and the historical- critical methods born of it. These methods, in turn, highlight many of the book’s puzzling compo- nents. Did Esther present pre-Reformation interpreters with the same difficulties? Was Esther neglected to the same degree as it is today? Not surprisingly, medieval interpreters’ resolved the apparent theological silence of Esther through allegorical interpretations. Surprisingly, however, medieval interpreters’ failed fully to systematize this allegorical scheme because they could not decide how to incorporate Esther into it. Their discomfort with a female savior embodied concerns that later feminist interpreters have raised. Also surprisingly, in the period before the adoption of an Corresponding author: Mark E. Biddle, Sophia Theological Seminary, PO Box 9351, Richmond, VA 23227, USA. Email: [email protected] 138 Review and Expositor 118(2) allegorical template for interpreting the book, the Patristic era also struggled with the historicity of the book, its silence regarding God, and its protagonist’s marriage outside Israel. Unfortunately, the violence central to Esther does not seem to have troubled interpreters active before the modern era. Instead, they associated it with the behavior of “the church militant” in a theology that would pro- duce crusades and inquisitions. In “The significance of the apocryphal Greek Additions to Esther for the church today,” Nancy deClaissé-Walford explores another early mechanism for redressing some of Hebrew Esther’s per- ceived shortcomings, namely the Greek translation of the book. This translation tradition subjected Esther to a wholesale re-orientation by means of a series of expansions consisting of speeches and prayers on the lips of Esther and Mordecai. These expansions resound with references and appeals to God, Torah citations, and references to the grand events in Israel’s salvation history. deClaissé- Walford takes readers on a tour of this material that yields important insights into Diaspora Judaism, the context of early Christianity, and the worldview of the era. Barry A. Jones, in “Life in the Diaspora: Christian interpretation of Esther in dialogue with Judaism,” sees in implications of the book of Esther in relation to the Shoah a call for Christian confession that, for too long, too readily, and too deeply, the Christian church adopted Haman’s anti-Semitism. Haman’s foiled intention, Christian anti-Semitism, exposed in subsequent pogroms and inquisitions, ultimately matured in Hitler’s nearly-successful attempt at genocide. For Jones, read in this context, the theological message of Esther is far from obscure. It is unmistakable: Haman was not God’s servant; anti-Jewish hostility is contrary to God’s will! Elizabeth Newman also offers an explicitly theological reading of Esther in “Where in the world is God? On finding the Divine in Esther,” an article that address the same problem as the Greek additions do. Acknowledging that, of all the books of the Bible, Esther seems the “least available for theological analysis,” Newman nonetheless points to several features of the book that contradict this position, namely, fasting, Mordecai’s possible oblique reference to the deity in his challenge to Esther, Ahasuerus’s sleeplessness, and the ultimate victory of the Jews over their enemies. In Newman’s reading, Esther recounts human action against the background of God’s enabling will in a way that highlights the interplay in primary and secondary causality. To recognize this interplay properly requires a “stereoscopic view” of divine and human action in one reality that combines both. Christine Brown Jones turns attention to two ways in which “Experiencing Esther” is possible: as it is interpreted to an audience in cinematic treatments and as it appears when read through the lens of empire. Both approaches represent the effort to read “Esther into contemporary life” in the further attempt to “recognize the complexity of experiences that shape us and our communities.” Jones discovers that movie versions of the Esther story frequently “take liberties” with the biblical text, usually at points and in ways that “smooth over” elements of the text that complicate its inter- pretation as Christian scripture. In other words, they can help to sharpen the insights of a viewer/ reader into the actual content of the canonical text. Similarly, attention to the dynamics of imperial power operative in the text of Esther “shines light on other issues like identity, difference, and negotiation with power, issues that remain relevant . . . today.” The three expository articles in this issue turn from examinations of problem areas in Esther interpretation to examples of how Esther can, indeed, be read as Christian scripture. Asking “Can anything good come out of Susa? Preaching from the scroll of Esther,” Tony W. Cartledge begins with general comments on preaching from Esther in which he observes that biblical preaching usu- ally involves either expositing a text or expounding a theme. Cartledge opts largely for the latter in his survey of a series of Esther texts that provide opportunities for such thematic treatments: Who Knows . . . Such a Time (4:17); Just Say No—Vashti’s Dignity (1:1–21); A Star is Born (2:1–18); Good, Bad, Ugly (2:19–7:10); The Danger of Winning—Haman’s Fall (8:1–9:17); and Always Remember—Purim, the Power of Memory (9:18–10:3). Biddle 139 In “‘And all who joined them’: A faithful Christian reading of Esther in a post-Shoah world,” Julie Gaines Walton considers the silence of God in Esther, which Diaspora Judaism must have experienced as a painful reality and asks poignantly on behalf of today’s reader, “If obedience saves God’s people from genocide and allows them to receive the best, how do we explain the Shoah?” Her answer returns to Esther where God is present “in an unjust situation: through the actions of those seeking to act righteously and justly even while waiting for God to act.” Aware that Esther is only Christian scripture in a somewhat secondary fashion, Gaines Walton suggests that Christian readers identify with those who joined the Jews in “celebrating” Purim so that Esther becomes an invitation for Gentile Christians “to join, not to co-opt but to join, in responding to the call to act justly and without waiting.” Melissa A. Jackson and Bert Young conclude this section with “Horribly hilarious: An interpre- tation of Esther,” an interpretive retelling of the Esther story in two voices, a retelling that depends heavily on a strand of recent Esther scholarship that views the book as farce. Both voices clearly have in view the biblical text and, at the same time, the world that exists around today’s reader/ hearer of Esther. One voice presents a version of the story that conforms rather closely to the explicit denotation of the biblical text; the other makes explicit the connotations, implications, and inferences that lie between the lines of the biblical text. The second voice—which one suspects represents the opinion of the authors—for example, speculates concerning the motivations and intentions of key characters in the book. The contrast between the journalistic tone of the one and the skeptical, sarcastic, mocking of the other lays bare the discrepancy between the supposed order- liness and solidity of a range of institutions, from Persian imperial structures to the shakiness of the foundations of patriarchy, before subjecting the notion of peace through violence to the kind of critique that only humor can accomplish. This issue concludes with the customary collection of insightful reviews of recent important books of interest to the readership of Review & Expositor. Author biography Mark E. Biddle, Dr. Theol., is Dean of the Faculty at Sophia Theological Seminary and represents the SBTS tradition on the editorial board of this journal. His publications include commentaries on Deuteronomy (Smyth & Helwys) and Judges (Reading the OT), several monographs (e.g., Missing the Mark (Abingdon) and A Time to Laugh (Smyth & Helwys)), and scores of articles and book reviews.