Haman’s decree and his evil plot is not being undone. Verse
6:6 shows the arrogance of Haman:
So Haman entered the king’s
chambers. He waited for the king to speak first.
King Ahasuerus: Haman,
I want to ask you something. What do you believe is the proper manner in
which to honor a man who has pleased me?
Then Haman thought to himself,
“There is no one the king wishes to honor more than me.”
Haman went ahead and told the king what HE would want. To
his shock the king was honoring the man Haman hated, Mordecai. So now Haman not
only had to honor him, but had to lead the procession he thought should be for
himself. So Haman was humiliated in his mind and left right after the
procession honoring Mordecai.
As the story unfolds from the procession, Haman is rushed
off to dinner with the king and queen, again thinking it was to honor him.
Verse 7:3 opens with the queen trying to save her cousin and herself:
If you favor me, my king, and if it
pleases you, spare my life. That’s all I’m asking for—that my
people and I be spared. That is my wish.
I assume the king was taken back since she was not known to
be a Jew until that time. Also, the king was shown that Haman had made the
order and therefore his fate was sealed. He was scurried off and killed in the
same manner he was planning for Mordecai.
As you finish the story notice a couple of things. First,
the king was tied to the order that Haman had given, he could not repeal it.
That sounds like today when the president makes an “executive order” that must
be followed and congress claims they cannot do anything to stop it. The king
needed to have another law made that counteracted the current law. Thus we see
why so many laws become necessary as a society progresses. The tax law is so
complex because loopholes were made and then closed and more were found. A
simple law has become huge.
Second, the queen had an opportunity to show mercy and she
did not. She continued to allow the Jews to kill their opponents into the next
day. Reading this story with the “Jesus Prism” it seems brutal since
forgiveness and grace is missing. Instead the Jews kill all those who are about
to kill them and when it was over, they got permission to kill even more. In
the end almost 76,000 people were killed. I wonder how many were true enemies
of the Israelites and how many were just following orders?
Today, we are told to turn the other cheek and if it means
death in the name of Jesus then so be. So while this story shows how God takes
a story and in the end we see how it was put into play to protect the people.