Esther 7
So the king and Haman went to Queen Esther’s banquet. On this second occasion, while they were drinking wine, the king again said to Esther, “Tell me what you want, Queen Esther. What is your request? I will give it to you, even if it is half the kingdom!” Queen Esther replied, “If I have found favor with the king, and if it pleases the king to grant my request, I ask that my life and the lives of my people will be spared. [Finally, Esther reveals her true identity.] For my people and I have been sold to those who would kill, slaughter, and annihilate us. [These are the exact words Haman used in the decree (Esther 3:13).] If we had merely been sold as slaves, I could remain quiet, for that would be too trivial a matter to warrant disturbing the king.” [Esther has to communicate two difficult things: she has been lying about who she is, and she has to tell the king he was foolish for trusting Haman.]
“Who would do such a thing?” King Xerxes demanded. “Who would be so presumptuous as to touch you?”
Esther replied, “This wicked Haman is our adversary and our enemy.” Haman grew pale with fright before the king and queen. [This is Haman’s first time hearing that Esther is Jewish. He had no idea his decree would include the queen. Haman thought he had the situation under control—idols will deceive you.] Then the king jumped to his feet in a rage and went out into the palace garden.
Haman, however, stayed behind to plead for his life with Queen Esther, for he knew that the king intended to kill him. [Another major power shift—instead of the king and Haman having the power, the king and queen have the power.] In despair he fell on the couch where Queen Esther was reclining, just as the king was returning from the palace garden.
The king exclaimed, “Will he even assault the queen right here in the palace, before my very eyes?” And as soon as the king spoke, his attendants covered Haman’s face, signaling his doom. [Haman is going to die for a crime he did not even commit (assaulting the queen). Is that not the same thing he was trying to do to the Jews?]
Then Harbona, one of the king’s eunuchs, said, “Haman has set up a sharpened pole that stands seventy-five feet tall in his own courtyard. He intended to use it to impale Mordecai, the man who saved the king from assassination.”
“Then impale Haman on it!” the king ordered. So they impaled Haman on the pole he had set up for Mordecai, and the king’s anger subsided.
RESPONSE
- Read Proverbs 16:18–19. What ultimately led to Haman’s downfall?
- We have talked a lot about how randomness in the book of Esther is actually God working behind the scenes. Where do we see that in today’s reading?
- How does the relationship with the king and Esther compare to the way that the king treated Vashti in the beginning of the book?