Dear friends,
Tonight and tomorrow we will be celebrating the happiest day in the Jewish calendar, the festival of Purim when we will eat lots, drink more, and generally be so very merry. We also read Megillat Esther, the book of Esther which tells us the ultimate feel-good story, and one which is the exception to the rule of Jewish suffering throughout our history.
Basically, it goes like this: About 2,500 years ago the Persian Empire was at the height of its power. It ruled the whole known world at the time except for a few Greek city-states who had some weird ideas of democracy and freedom which stood in contrast to the Persian idea of absolute subservience to the Persian ruler. The Jews however, all lived under the control of the Persian Empire.
The King himself seemed pretty well disposed to the Jewish population even inviting them to a decadent party lasting seven days. Actually, he himself was already partying for 180 days we are told, so this was more like the after party of the longest bender ever recorded.
At any rate life seemed pretty ok for Jews living under king Achashverosh’s rule. Problem was he kept making really poor judgements. First he killed his wife when she didn’t want to perform and then he raised Haman, an awful character, to the highest position of authority under the king himself.
This Haman character, as we are told, was an absolute megalomaniac. He had the king decree by law that everybody must prostrate themselves every time they saw him which is precisely what happened. With one exception. Mordechai, the Jew, refused to kneel and bow. When the royal guards asked what was going on, he explained that he was Jewish and reserves the kneeling position to God alone. When Haman heard of this he flew into a fury and decided to not only destroy Mordechai for showing such disrespect, but became hell-bent on destroying his entire people.
To cut a long story short, Haman got the king to decree death to the Jews on the 13th of Adar. Every Jew – man, woman, and child – was to be killed on this day. By this time, Esther, who had hidden her Jewish identity, was the favourite wife of the king. Although initially reluctant to get involved, she ended up inviting Haman to a dinner with herself and the king. She told the king of an evil design to kill her people. Having aroused the king’s fury, she then points to Haman as that evil person. The king then orders Haman to be hanged at the gallows he prepared for Mordechai, and the Jews were decreed by law to stand up for themselves and destroy those who wish them harm. In Shushan the capital, they killed at least 500 people including the ten sons of Haman.
No wonder we party so hard on Purim! We went from a situation in which total Jewish annihilation was quite realistic, and landed on top with the evil schemers meeting their untimely death by their very own methods. Very sweet indeed.
But I think there is yet greater depth to this drama and what it can teach us. As mentioned earlier, Haman’s issue with the Jews stemmed from the fact that Mordechai would not bow down to him. How petty for the second most powerful human being in the world at the time to get into such an all-consuming fit of rage when one person refuses, on religious grounds, to acknowledge his immense power. If the crime is hardly anything, the response, to annihilate the entire people to which he belongs, is like a nightmarish tantrum.
This megalomaniacal tendency and its inevitable overreach is exactly what we see with all sorts of tyrants throughout history. It may easily be argued for instance that Hitler’s decision to take on Stalin, led to his ultimate downfall. Even when he did attack Russia, if he would have listened to his military experts in terms of how to accomplish it, things may have turned out differently.
Which leads me to Donald Trump and the silly debate raging about whether Trump is like Hitler. To the best of my knowledge Trump has not written a sequel to Mein Kampf or laid out plans for a final solution. In fact he hasn’t provided solutions to any problems other than how to get voted by the disgruntled masses of the Republican Party.
What is clear though is that he really doesn’t care for immigrants, women, or any sense of morality. In fact, he really doesn’t care for anyone or anything other than himself. Being a billionaire and a celebrity simply doesn’t cut it for this narcissist, he also feels the need to hold the most powerful political position in the world.
To people like Donald Trump, who deal with existential fears and insecurities intrinsic to the human condition by channeling and fostering bigotry, the message of Purim is “beware”! The higher you go, the harder you’ll fall.
Lechaim!
Rabbi Shneur
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