ester, brandy style
introduction: the book of ester should start with ester and not have "fillers" that only fill the pages with unrelated words. brandy is made by distilling "alcoholic" wine to make it more concentrated by removing more water so that is what i will do and edit the story to add surprises.
ester: chapter one: ester
ONE ester felt joy. at dawn she would enter her 18 year and her birthday will begin. she planned on celebrating with her two best friends hadasa... and arava. she felt so excited that she could not sleep so she left her soft bed and sat on a chair in the dark. she tried to control her breathing: in, wait, out and repeat. soon she felt drowsy and returned to her soft mattress under her thick winter quilt filled with bird feathers.
that night she dreamt an amazing dream which motivated her mysterious actions. at dawn ma woke ester and said 'wake up and help me cook breakfast. we want you to meet a man to marry."
"not again, you pick only the gross men." ester moaned. then she recalled her special day, only once each year and asked, "ma how will we celebrate my birthday this year?" ma sneered in ridicule, "today is not your birthday, which was the 14 of adar, yesterday." ester argued, "no it is today. look at the calendar." however ma insisted they only use the jewish calendar, so today is a regular day. she felt that her stingy jew parents had skipped her birthday again. it must be revenge for her rejecting each of the many men, all very gross, that they tried to match her for wedding.
this year ester tried a new argument, "if you follow the adar calendar then you should have made me a birthday on that day." ma argued "too late. now go fetch water so i can cook the eggs." ester knew that her parents' selection of men were gross. she left toward the well but decided she would not return. instead ester went to hadasa's house. hadasa was poor. the home was small but still made ester jealous because hadasa not only celebrated a birthday but even had invited ester to come. now ester wanted to give, returning her joy. she took some of her silver coins and purchased a fancy cake from hadasa's pa, then she called hadasa and they ate the sweet cake together.
somebody politely said, "thank you for sharing your cake." the voice was hadasa's. ester corrected her, "i must thank you. only you make my birthday joy instead of lonely and sad.' hadasa asked, "did your parents find you a man?" ester answered, "many men but only the gross ones. i want a prince." hadasa suggested, "try for the king!" ester accepted her idea. --2 the palace
TWO during the kingdom of "cyrus son of xerxes", ester came to the palace. she only knew a bit of the history: some jews had already returned to jerusalem. cyrus king of persia had sent jews to jerusalem and gave money for them to build a temple. ester had doubts. was that good? they claimed to honor God by burning sheep? or maybe better to obey the message in jeremia that "god of israel denied commanding to offer sacrifices." her heart said to obey the prophecy [in book jeremia chapter seven] but nobody around her respected that message. they only read from the book but ignored that message. she knew, now that she saw her dream, those temple worshippers were evil sinners against the one true God who sent a message by jeremia to correct the error. we must avoid the sinners and wait in susa therefore she made a plan so the stay in susa would be safe.
she also knew about king darius who favored zrubabel and that during his kingdom the temple "was built". [correcting error in talmud]. xerxes son of darius favored the jews. after xerxes died his son cyrus ruled. his other name was artaxerxes who "was called by us asurs." two generations after the temple was built ester went to the palace of king cyrus son of xerxes.
ester approached the guards and said "the king wants to see me." she was certain this was true. the gaurds searched her for a knife. the knife for the birthday cake was at hadasa's home so they let her in believing her. she went along the corridors of the palace and told each guard, as she was certain "the king wants to see me." at the door of the kings chamber again she repeated her message to the guards who again searched her and let her in.
the king was VERY pleased and she had been correct. "oh king, your majesty," ester began, "if you will know who i am, you will want me as your queen." the king stopped his discussion and said, "you can join my harem of many wives if you wish." ester argued, "you will see i am fit to be queen." he favored her and set a time to dine with her then he returned to his decisions.
the harem head asked ester her ethnicity. she said "i will only tell the king." he offered her perfumes of scented oils and more but she only asked to cut her hair in a certain style and shave with a razor all other hair from her body.
the palace quality blades were much better. she chose new clothing and robes to prepare for the dinner. they gave her colorful soft shoes too. at dinner she sat with the king and told him imaginary stories that she had generated. they ate the soft beef and drank the sweet wine. "i enjoy being with you very much," said the king. ester bargained, "i want to be the exclusive queen. reject any other queen and free the harem." the king raised his eyebrow, but considered he was bored of the harem anyway and this young girl was far better than the queen. in fact he had only wed her for inheriting the kingdom but now they were married he was king so he could divorce her. immediately he agreed to ester's ultimatum. --3 the first party
THREE ester encouraged the king to make a party for his closest advisors and governors to announce the change. the king celebrated a huge party and announced he was divorcing his queen and replacing her with ester. the advisors asked "who is she? is she royal?" the king answered, "i dont care about any of that. i enjoy sitting with her. even seeing her soothes my heart. NOW she is royal as my queen." the governors sent and dragged the dethroned queen. they asked "she was your queen what will you do to her?" the king compared, for the first time and saw that ester was much more beautiful. "send her back to her parents," ordered the king. so they escorted her out from susa.
that night ester offered her body to the king but the king felt weak and only asked for a story. so she told him a story which she had imagined and invented. the story was so interesting for him that he struggled to stay awake but his eyes were tired from the efforts of the day... and he slept.
the next morning ester slept late. nobody woke her as her ma had always woke her at dawn she was QUEEN! She feasted on a SWEET CAKE EVEN SOFTER THAN THE FRESH BIRTHDAY CAKE that she shared with hadasa. she DARED to interrupt the king again. she entered his meeting with the governors and requested lunch meal with the king. he answered "even now i will interrupt and hear your ideas." the governors showed shock because they had important issues but they must submit to the king.
ester announced, "surely you can guess that i wanted to be queen for the purpose of influencing you to do something." the king said "i dont care about that. you can ask for ANYTHING." an advisor added "meaning if reasonable request."
"i want you to decree to arrange an army of volunteers: anybody who wants to kill the jews can volunteer and have royal protection to organize and kill the jews of this city." the king shrugged "whatever you wish." [note: ester caused the replacement of the queen, ester went to meet the king and she caused the decree due to his emotion for her sorry rabi yosi this is more plausible.] the governors protested "your majesty, they will kill many tax paying jews. you will have less money from taxes." the king shrugged, "if she wants it, i will give her anything. i enjoy her so much." an advisor challenged ester "you must consider the expense of hiring soldiers and their weapons and uniforms.." ester explained that they would be paid by looting the jews. as for uniforms, on the day before the attack they can take the uniforms from regular soldiers just for the day.
immediately the king "sent RIDERS" for the sake of ester to arrange the army, not only in the city Susa as she requested, but also in all his vast kingdom from India to Ethiopia. Anybody who wanted to kill jews came and joined the army. they were protected by royal decree and were organized into army groups. when people saw the royal protection, they stopped hiding their hate and felt free to join and enlist. thousands of persians joined, not only those who were swindled by jews in business tricks. more joined in the many other provinces.
a week passed while the king was busy with many governors. at night he was too drowsy to call for her. finaly ester told the king he must rest from his jobs and set one day of rest undisturbed only with her. the king ordered all the governors to delay any new decision and govern based on previous decisions and laws. he must have a day of rest with his beloved queen.
the queen started the day with breakfast and asked the king about his hopes for the future. the king said he planned on making a war to take more land from a neighbor. "what do your advisors say?" king explaind, "they say the neighbor has powerful allies and we risk too much." ester added "i also prefer times of peace. dont you agree i am enough for you without more land." the king agreed and asked for a story. ester entertained him for a full hour with a story that she had imagined. at the end of the story the king felt very happy with the hapy ending. "your stories satisfy me more than any peasure i ever enjoyed with the previous queen."
"then it is time for my next request in my agenda." the king said "i appreciate your honesty but i really do not care if you have any agenda as queen i will give you anything. your idea of paying the soldiers by looting is brilliant! you are a genius a great mastermind!" he praised.
FOUR the second request
ester now revealed the conclusion of her plan, "my king this whole arrangement was only to reveal who in your kingdom had strong hate so strong as to murder! in truth i am ester a jew and i wanted my enemy to feel protected and free to reveal they hated enough to kill!" the king raised his eyebrows and wagged a finger, saying "you sneaky sneaky tigress! i thought you hated jews as much as i did! but that was before i met you! i do hate the parents who ignore their child's pain in circumcision their own son!!" ester herself was heartless too and had planned on circumcising her son too without any thought to the pain nor loss of blood nor loss of the body part. for the sake of her plan she instantly switched sides saying, "oh my king i and some jews do not want to continue those cruel practices anymore."
"that is a relief! i do not want OUR son cut!" he said. ester agreed soothingly "certainly not" as she choked on her words it was difficult for her to lie... she began to doubt if she were truly a jew. a lie would be easier or even pleasant of she were a jew. why was lying difficult now?
ester concluded her plan, "now that you know my intention tell the governors to arrange lists in each WALLED city and WITH YOUR ADVISORS select from the list first the most powerful or influential or richest of the jew exterminator unit. bring them to the office with the deception of appointing generals for training and then execute the leaders. EVEN the one here, THE MAN you favor, erase his name, he has joined the list, with his ten sons. the king hesitated, but only a moment, "you are far more precious. not only will i execute him but more, i will PUBLICLY hang him and his ten sons by rope from a tree." he sent soldiers and soon all eleven were hanging dead. hegave her personal ownership of that man's land and property.
"my jewish queen i will do that and more i will gradualy execute EVERY one on that list who wants to harm your nation."
SO IT WAS. the governors arranged lists in every walled city and any major port on a river of soldiers. the most powerful or influential or richest were sent from all throughout the kingdom to be appointed generals but on their arrival were instantly sent to the dungeon where the executioners were busy chopping off the heads of those murderers. the bodies would be too numerous to bury so the king made a FEAST 180 days with the meat that the executioners cut off the murderer bodies. enough generals were "appointed" to feed the party of thousands for almost half a year.
the king confiscated the property of the rich and their precious items were emptied from the homes to the royal treasury while the local governors were granted ownership of those lands. the justic continued as the king had agreed and every single soldier on the list from each city "in 127 provinces from india to ethiopia" was executed either in the palace or in their own province. only the queen knew the reason for the executions. every name on the list of volunteers was exectude by the king and his governors totalling nearly SEVENTY FIVE THOUSAND of the jew enemies. THIS WAS the source of the meat and soup served for 180 days in the third year of the king. for the next nine years of the king until the twelfth year of the king the jews had peace.
finally in year twelve ester had a second request. she asked the king to put her cruel parents in the dungeon and after they and the other relatives who had done mean actions to her or even harsh words were in the dungeon, then it was time to reveal the secret.
on ester's birthdate 14 Adar the king announced the secret purifying that he had done nine years before. he had PURIFIED the kingdom from india to ethiopia including jerusalem of the jew haters and the jews celebrated on the 14 day of adar and added an additional day also for EVERYONE to celebrate the 15 too. "all jews celebrated two days" source josephus flavius. the added day was to symbolize that the original decree had specified walled cities despite in the end all towns were purified and for this the jews rejoice... not for winning any battle but for the cleverness of the queen and the salvation from the enemies of the jews in that vast region from india to ethiopia such "we thank queen ester's memory." amen
the end.
endnote: the scroll of esther, chapters 9 and 10 "purified" from flaws and in a better order with less repetition: "in the twelfth year [chapter 3] of the king, in the "twelfth" month "called by us Adar," on the thirteenth day, the king's message revealing his edict got written. those who hated Jews had hoped to murder, but the king reversed their plan, they died instead. almost None on the list remained against the jews. the announcement occurred on the fourteenth, that is why The Jews in Susa rejoiced on the "fourteenth" day of the month Adar. the people, who now knew what the king did to the enemies of the jews respected jews. all the nobles of the provinces, governors and king’s administrators helped the Jews, because they feared queen Ester. Jews were safe from those who wanted to kill them. now the king revealed that In Susa, the king had killed five hundred noblemen and took their property. this was the reason that he had publicly hung THAT man, may his name be erased. the most important day had been when three hundred noblemen arrived in Susa, from many provinces, to be appointed generals in their cities, so the king executed them all on the same day, on the fifteenth of adar that year. The Jews in Susa, added celebration for that. in the twelfth year, the king said to Queen Esther, “i killed five hundred of Susa's noblemen. what is your request, that I will grant.”
“If it pleases the king,” Esther answered, “Hang, publicly that man’s ten sons.” the king commanded this, and so it was, the ten sons of that man were publicly hung. now that this secret was revealed, Jews in the king’s provinces assembled to celebrate the relief from danger. The total killed was almost seventy-five thousand listed in the army books volunteering to attack jews.
the king sent letters to all provinces to reveal the secret. the following year, Jews everywhere rejoiced a festival on the fourteenth. They gave portions to poor jews. The Jews assembled throughout the provinces of the kingdom to celebrate and thank the queen. the jews began celebrating "annually the fourteenth and fifteenth days of the month Adar" to thank ester by remembering the relief from their enemies. the fear of a royal army to kill jews was finally relieved and turned into joy. "they had established for themselves" [verse 31] and their children. these days were called Purim, from the word "pur, meaning destiny" [verse 26] due to the safety from the enemies of the Jews, who had prepared to kill Jews but were themselves killed. even the one who the king favored, he and his sons were hung on wood. they celebrated, one generation [oral law method] and one [singular and verse 31 "their children"], family and family walled city and another, town and town. the memory of these days of Purim should never end by their children. Queen Esther wrote "this second letter" concerning Purim. queen ester was SECOND to the king, demanding good for the jews, her nation. now that the secret deception was revealed, this cyrus king of susa kingdom imposed a tax on the vast kingdom and islands [chapter ten, so none would doubt his authority.] She persuaded peace, so the king and "all his sons" [would not attack any war, same as above] had peace." note: removing the repetition and changing the order reduced these two chapters 9&10 from 900 words to 500 words by almost 50% therefore i added a description of who ester was and the details of jew hatred. also i ended with the word peace which the scroll tried but failed. also the conclusion emphasized that "they accepted on them selves" and the memory of the "change in destiny the rescue from danger" so other "good details" must not distract from the "main point" as described in the conclusion and so i removed any conflicting or distracting details meaning delete chapters 4, and 6, because ester "knew" and her initiative was to go to the king and switch queens and the plan [replacing chapters 1,2,3]. chapters 5 and 7 are good suspense but outrageously lengthy. see you next year!
“If it pleases the king,” Esther answered, “Hang, publicly that man’s ten sons.” the king commanded this, and so it was, the ten sons of that man were publicly hung. now that this secret was revealed, Jews in the king’s provinces assembled to celebrate the relief from danger. The total killed was almost seventy-five thousand listed in the army books volunteering to attack jews.
the king sent letters to all provinces to reveal the secret. the following year, Jews everywhere rejoiced a festival on the fourteenth. They gave portions to poor jews. The Jews assembled throughout the provinces of the kingdom to celebrate and thank the queen. the jews began celebrating "annually the fourteenth and fifteenth days of the month Adar" to thank ester by remembering the relief from their enemies. the fear of a royal army to kill jews was finally relieved and turned into joy. "they had established for themselves" [verse 31] and their children. these days were called Purim, from the word "pur, meaning destiny" [verse 26] due to the safety from the enemies of the Jews, who had prepared to kill Jews but were themselves killed. even the one who the king favored, he and his sons were hung on wood. they celebrated, one generation [oral law method] and one [singular and verse 31 "their children"], family and family walled city and another, town and town. the memory of these days of Purim should never end by their children. Queen Esther wrote "this second letter" concerning Purim. queen ester was SECOND to the king, demanding good for the jews, her nation. now that the secret deception was revealed, this cyrus king of susa kingdom imposed a tax on the vast kingdom and islands [chapter ten, so none would doubt his authority.] She persuaded peace, so the king and "all his sons" [would not attack any war, same as above] had peace." note: removing the repetition and changing the order reduced these two chapters 9&10 from 900 words to 500 words by almost 50% therefore i added a description of who ester was and the details of jew hatred. also i ended with the word peace which the scroll tried but failed. also the conclusion emphasized that "they accepted on them selves" and the memory of the "change in destiny the rescue from danger" so other "good details" must not distract from the "main point" as described in the conclusion and so i removed any conflicting or distracting details meaning delete chapters 4, and 6, because ester "knew" and her initiative was to go to the king and switch queens and the plan [replacing chapters 1,2,3]. chapters 5 and 7 are good suspense but outrageously lengthy. see you next year!