Y~r. 8.-Abo he gave him the oopy. In Ver. 14.-Then ahall there enlargement, the original it is "R copy." Mordecai had or reapiration (marg. literally, "breath"), )rnr! R ~opy made for the purpose of hRnding and deliveranoe arhe to the J"ews from 11 t.o Esther. To make request to him for another plaoe. Mordecai is confident thnt her peo]>le. If this was the phrRSe used by God will not allow the destruction of his Mordecai to Hat.Reh, Esther's nRtionality people. Without narnin~ his name, ho im- must now have ceased to be a secret, at any plies R trust in his gracious promises, nnd rate so far as her immediate RttendRnts were a conviction that Haman's purpose will be concerned. Probably Mordecai felt thRt the frustrated ; how, he kno,vs not, but certninly truth must now be declared. It was only as in some way or other. If deliverauco does the compatriots of the queen that he could not come through Esther, thou it will 111ise expect to get the J cws spared. from some other quarter. But thou and Yer. 11.-AU the king's servants seems thy father's house shall be destroyed. A to mean here "all the court," "all those in denunciation of Divine vengeance. Though the immediate senice of the J..-i.n$." The the nation will be saved, it will not benefit inner oourt. The palace had, as 1t would you. On you will fall a just judgment- seem, only two courts, the "outward court" having endeavoured to save your life, you of eh. vi. 4, a.nd the "inner court" of the will lose it-and your "father's house" will present passage. There is one law of his to be involved in your ruin. We may gather put him to death. Rather, "there is one from this that Esther was not .Abihail's only law for him." Whoever he be, there is one child. Who knoweth, &c. Consider this and the same law regarding him-he must also. Perhaps (who knows! ) God has raised suffer death. Herodotus excepts six persons yon up to your royal dignity for this very from the operation of this law (iii 84, 118), purpose, and none other, that yon should but in ma.king the exception shows the be in e. position to save your nation in this general rule to have been such as here repre- crisis. sented. Except such to whom the king Ver. 15.-Faat ye for me. Fasting .for shall hold out the golden sceptre. No another is fasting to obtain God's blessing other writer tells us of this custom, but it on that other, and is naturally accompanied is in perfect harmony with Oriental habits with earnest prayer to God for the person and modes of thought. Some have objected who is the object of the fast. Thus here that the king would not always have a golden again the thought of God underlies the nar- sceptre by him ; but the Persepolitan sculp- rative. It has been supposed that Esther tures uniformly represent him with a long could not have meant a.n absolute fast-- tapering staff in his hand, which is probably complete abstinence from both food and the "sceptre" (sharbi,t,h) of Esther. I have d.rin.k:-for so long a period as three days ; not been called to come in llllto the king but Oriental abstemiousness would not be these thirty days. The king's passion had very severely taxed by a fast of this length. cooled, and Esther now, like his other wives, The time intended-from the evening of the waited her occasional summons to his pre- first to the morning of the third day-need sence. She had not been called for a whole not have much exceeded thirty-six hours. I month, and did not know when a summons also and my maidens will fa.at likewise. might come. It would not do to trnst to so " Likewise" is to be taken here in its proper mere a chance ; a.nd therefore, if she was to sense, as meaning "in like manner," We interpose on behalf of her nation, she must also will abstain both from meat and drink intrude on the king uninvited, and risk during the same period. being put to death. Ver. 17.-Mordecai . . . did according Ver. 13.-Think not with thy■elf. Liter- to e.11 that Esther had commanded. I. e. ally, "imagine not in thy mind." That gathered the Jews togethn, and proclainied thou shalt escape in the king's hou■ e. I. e. a three days' fast. Though without authority, " that being an inmate of the ;ealace will be he would naturally, under the circumstances, a.ny protection to thee;" it will be no pro- have sufficient influence over his countrymen tection-you will no more escape than any to induce them to do his bidding. other Jew.
HOMILETICS. Vere. 1-3.-The cry of a doomed poople. The decree against the Jews was not yet known in the palace ; Esther herself was not yet informed of it. And the signs . of sorrow and mourning were prohibited within the royal precincts ; nothing of ill omen was suffered to come before the king and his household. But in the city evil tidings (which ever travel fast) soon came abroad. I. THE FIRST NOT.f: OF LAMEN'J'AT!ON WAS O'l'T!l:RED DY MonDECi\I, The rending OH, IV. 1-17.J THE BOOK OF ESTHER. 85
of clothes in grief was practised by the Persians e.s well as by the Jews. The Nine- vites in their penitence eat in sackcloth and ashes. It was and is the custom of Orient11le to weep aloud in times of mourning. All these expressions of sorrow and lamentation were in the circumstances n11tural and proper. It was the woe of a p11triot. Mordec11i was not thinking so much of himself as of his people ; be made their sorrows and nl11rms his own. It was the sorrow of a godly man. He did not simply mourn ; he evidently humbled himself before God, and implored Divine pity and help. II. THE CRY WAS COMMUNICATED TO AND TAKEN UP BY THE JEWS THROUGHOUT THE EMPIRF:. The news of a great victory flies and flashes through a land, awakens the universal joy, and the land is filled with gladness and song. And the tidings of the impending calamity spread far and wide through the provinces of Persia, and created consternation in thousands of hearts. They mourned as they thought of the land of their fathers, and of nil the privileges enjoyed in that sacred and fertile territory-their proper home and inheritance. For now they were not only doomed to exile ; they were marked for destruction. They fasted, doubtless, as a religious exercise, accompanying their fasting with repentance and with prayers. They wept and wailed, knowing that though their cry could not pierce the walls of the palace at Sbusban, it would penetrate the gates of heaven, and reach the ear of the King of kings. They lay in sackcloth and ashes, as permitting themselves no comfort or ease in prospect of their own and their bretbren's ruin. Thus they prepared a way for the tender mercy of God to visit them from on high. Practical lesson :-Sinners against whom a sentence of Divine wrath might right- fully be issued should lose no time in humbling themselves before the Lord, and confessing their sins with contrition and repentance, that they may partake in the mercy of heaven, and, through the redemption of Christ Jesus, be saved from the wrath to come.