The Bare Facts --
Overviews and Outlines --
Bible Studies: Whole Book -- Part of Book --
Sermons -- Bibliographies
Many of the Bible's stories have been turned with variable success into films. Why has the book of Esther not met this treatment. What does it have? Certainly it carries everything that makes for a fine film. We have a splendid love story, divided loyalties, extreme ego, a monumental threat, and a fair amount of violence. Esther probably stands alone as a sort of Biblical novel better than any of the other stories in the Bible.
Esther is one of the five megillot and associated with the festival Purim. It deals with the portion of the captivity after Persia had overthrown Babylon.
Left: Andrea del Castagno's portrait of Esther, painted around 1450.
The Bare Facts
Who: Some ascribe this book to Mordecai, while others give credit
to Nehemiah. In the end, no educated guess can be made at the author of
this work.
Where: Whoever the author was, he seems to have been a resident of
Persia as his familiarity with matters Persian seem to suggest.
When: The book seems to have been written after the death of
Ahasuerus (Xerxes I) in about 465. Most conservatives date the book to the
second half of the fifth century B.C.
What: This book relates a tale of obedience, deference, bravery,
and divine protection. Although God is never mentioned in these chapters,
God simply drips from the pages of Esther.
Memorable Passages
Overviews and Outlines
- An Introduction to the
Book of Esther
- An outlined overview by David Malick.
- An Argument of the
Book of Esther
- One of David Malick's rhetorical outlines.
-
The Book of Esther
- A brief introduction by Arend Remmers.
- Bible Basics
- A very brief list of facts, but it includes a wav file pronouncing the
book's title.
- Easton Bible Dictionary:
Esther
- The article from M.G. Easton's 1897 Bible Dictionary.
- Catholic
Encyclopedia: Esther
- The appropriate entry from the public domain edition of this venerable
reference work.
- Columbia Encyclopedia:
Esther
- A brief article from the 2001 edition of this reference work.
- Bible Explained
- This is a commentary by an energetic fellow named Ted Wade. He
provides brief notes on each chapter and most verses for the entire Bible.
-
Luther Productions
- A very brief overview including key verses.
- The Blue
Letter Bible
- An excellent source for text, cross-references, concordance, language
helps, commentaries, and more.
- JPS Bible
- The JPS 1917 Bible text and another Jewish version. There are links
that supposedly go to two Hebrew and one Aramaic text but they don't seem to
work.
-
Jewish Encyclopedia
- An article from the 1901-06 reference work. Generally liberal in its
critical presuppositions.
Bible Studies: Whole Book
- Esther: A Study of
Divine Providence
- A five-lesson course by Bob Deffinbaugh.
- For Such a Time as
This--The Story of Ahasuerus and Esther
- A lesson from a 13-part series on marriage by Richard L. Strauss.
- Esther--Irony and
Providence
- The last installment in Bob Deffinbaugh's series From Creation to the
Cross.
- Love the Lord Bible
Studies: Esther
- A 9-lesson study with questions from an Arkansas-based ministry.
They seem orthodox enough, although the statement of faith makes me wonder if
they're not into prosperity gospel teachings.
- Talks for Growing
Christians
- A nifty study, which includes a brief sermon, question, and answers.
A project from Talks for Growing Christians.
-
Comments on the Book of Esther
- A lengthy commentary by L.M. Grant
-
The Book of Esther
- A chapter-by-chapter commentary by William Kelly.
- Geneva Notes
- In 1599, English Puritans, working in Geneva, published the first study
Bible. These are the notes from that edition.
- Coffman's
Commentary
- A verse-by-verse commentary by Dr. James Burton Coffman, a leading Church
of Christ scholar.
- Matthew Henry's
Commentary
- The chapter-by-chapter 1712 commentary by
the great English Puritan writer..
-
John Wesley Notes
- Over his career, the
founder of Methodism maintained notes on the entire
Bible.
-
JFB Commentary
- The comments of Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset and David Brown from
Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871).
- Clarke's
Commentary
- The first chapter for this book from
Adam Clarke's nineteenth-century
commentary.
- John Gill's Exposition of the
Entire Bible
- The commentary of the
17th century Baptist theologian and preacher.
-
Class Notes on Sacred History
- An 1893 commentary by
J.W. McGarvey.
- Scofield
Reference Notes
- The notes from the 1917 edition of the great study Bible. From a
dispensationalist viewpoint.
-
Old Testament Life and Literature
- Gerald Larue's 1968 overview of the Old Testament is, oddly enough, hosted
at an atheist website. Larue is decidely liberal in his presuppositions.
He dates Esther far later than conservative scholars.
- Treasury
of Scripture Knowledge
- A combination brief commentary and thorough cross-reference.
Developed by
R.A. Torrey.
- David Guzik's Commentaries on the Bible
- David Guzik, a former senior pastor at Clavary Chapel Simi Valley in
California, provides a verse-by-verse commentary. Currently Guzik directs the
Calvary Chapel Bible College in Siegen, Germany.
- Lessons from the Book of
Esther
- A rather casual-sounding set of comments.
-
Barry Bandstra: Esther
- A chapter from Bandstra's book Reading the Old Testament.
- The Jerome Bible
Commentary
- A commentary by a Catholic doctor, Jerome Dominguez, M.D. Is English
isn't perfect, but you have to admire his energy. Although Catholic in
orientation, this source has some good material for study.
- Megillat
Esther: Commentary by Rabbi Milevsky
- A Jewish commentary.
- Book of Esther
Commentary
- Another Jewish commentary. It's rather difficult to get into the
mode of this sort of commentary's style.
Bible Studies: Part of Book
-
Unspectacular Faithfulness (7:1-6,9-10)
- A sermon by William Willimon, Dean of the Chapel at Duke University.
-
Esther Commentary for a New Century (7:4)
- A beginning of a hypertext commentary. This looks and feels
unfinished.
- The Feast
of Purim (9:21-22)
- A sermon by Adrian Dieleman.
-
Morning and Evening (10:3)
- One of
C.H. Spurgeon's devotions.
Sermons
- Esther: A
Queen Under Control
- The appropriate sermon from
Ray C. Stedman's Adventuring through the Bible series.
- C.H. Spurgeon
- A listing of sermons, some of which are available online, by the
great British Baptist.
-
Esther: Ray Stedman
- A nine-sermon series by the former
pastor of Peninsula Bible Church.
- Sermon
Outlines
- Links to sermon outlines from
SermonLinks.
-
Rob Norris
- An 11-sermon series, audio only, from Fourth Presbyterian Church.
Articles, Books, and Bibliographies
- Foiling the First Nazi:
The Book of Esther
- A brief article by Chuck Missler.
-
Reading Esther from Left to Right: Contemporary Strategies for Reading a
Biblical Text
- An article from JSOT by David J.A. Clines.
- Hadassah
Bat Abihail: The Evolution from Object to Subject in the Character of
Esther
- An article from JBL by Joshua Berman. Starts on page 49 of the file.
- Where God is
Not: The Book of Esther and Song of Songs
- An article by David R. Blumenthal.
-
If Esther Had Not Been That Beautiful
- An article from Biblical Theology Bulletin, subtitled "Dealing with
a Hidden God in the Book of Esther." By Sabine Van Den Eynde.
- Holy
Disobedience in Esther
- An article from Theology Today by Karol Jackowski.
-
Bloody Purim and the Bloody Passion
- An article from Sojourners by Rabbi Arthur Waskow.
- The Bold and
the Biblical
- An article that compares Esther with romance novels. A bit out
there.
- The Symbolic
Function of Clothing in the Book of Esther
- An article by Jopie Siebert-Hommes from Lectio Difficilior, a
feminist journal.
- Selected Bibliography
of the Book of Esther
- A rather brief and non-annotated list of sources from David Malick.
-
Two-Age Bibliography
- A list of recommended sources, mostly scholarly in nature, provided by a
website devoted to the "Redemptive Historical" school of theology.
Memorable Passages