HaRaAYaH

OK, so that means you can't tell the story to kids because it's rated R. The message remains with or without the sex. It's actually irrelevant to the story except for adults who wouldn't believe the beauty pageant version. That Christians would distort something Jewish, I have no doubt. But I think beating up on Veggie tales is a little silly.....

By the way Song of Songs is really the Biblical porn....

perfectidius

well I didn't even mention the porn, but the "happy ending" of 75,000 of the Jews "enemies" being murdered at the end.

Oh, and I think that it is poor writing, by the Bible' standards.

Daniel

-Jay-

Well, I've actually had adult fundamentalist Christians (more than one...) describe Esther to me as a story about a beauty pageant, so it's not exclusively kids that are getting the euphemized version. Veggie Tales gets the focus of my attention because it was the subject of the opening post, but overall I'm beating up on a Biblical book that I consider to be extremely secular and not particularly relevant, as well as misrepresented to a significant proportion of people that are inclined to put a lot of stock in it.

If you'd like to turn the discussion to what you feel the underlying messages of Esther are, feel free. I'm certainly willing to consider another point of view on the matter. (I'm not trying to be snarky here at all, by the way. It would be an interesting discussion.)

(And I concur, by the way, that the Song of Songs is Biblical Porn as well...)

regards,

NinJay

Cesc

Madonna has changed her name to Esther.

Dont know if that tells ya anything

-Jay-

She has certainly never used her sexuality as a strategic asset...

HaRaAYaH

I couldn't possibly give you all of the meanings or lessons in the book of Esther. Google Purim or Mordechai and Haman and read up on it. I will give you two of my favorites.

The Calendar: The first holiday in the Jewish calendar is Passover. The last holiday in the Jewish calendar is Purim. The book of Esther is read publicly on Purim from a scroll (Megillah). There are five scrolls or Megillot (Esther, Ruth, Lamentations, Ecclesiastes and Song of Songs), but when you refer to "The Megillah" it always refers to Esther. On Passover in a traditional setting, Moses is not mentioned. It's all about God. God does it all. On Purim, God is not mentioned it's all about humanity. As we progress through the calendar of our lives, we are to depend on God less and less, it's up to us to complete the work or creation as we are partners with God in the enterprise.

Drinking Wine: On Purim the Talmud commands us to get so drunk with wine you cannot tell the difference between blessed be Mordechai and cursed be Haman. Why? It is to teach each one of us has the potential to be Mordechai or the potential to be Haman. Which way will we go? Will we follow the yetzer harah (evil inclination) and become Haman or the yetzer ha tov (good inclination) and become Mordechai?

These are just a couple of drashes about the Book of Esther. There are many. There is an entire tractate of Talmud called Megillah that deals with the issues surrounding the story in more detail than you could imagine.

nanaimo

I don't see how that relates to the actual content of the story of Esther at all.

HaRaAYaH

It's an explanation about why God is absent from the story.

-Jay-

Actually, I kind of like that explanation. It's a much better explanation than having someone come along later and add a bunch of material to make the story more "godly".

Regardless of what one's opinion of the Book of Esther in and of itself, it does provide a good example of alteration of a text to fit better within an orthodoxy. In this case, we happen to have available both the "before" and "after", so we can see what the effect of the additions was.

Thanks, HaRaAYaH.

regards,

NinJay

arnoldo

Out of curiosity, has anyone noticed the parallel between the incident of the hanging of the enemies of the jews in the Book of Esther and the hanging of a group of 10 Nazis sentenced to death by the Nuremberg War Crimes Tribunal?