Most people seem to write on Esther. Well, I’d like to be different, (what’s new), and write on Vashti in the book of Esther. Esther was indeed beautiful, but Vashti was quite pretty too. As a matter of fact, her very name means “beautiful.” She wasn’t very beautiful inwardly though, where it really counts. One of the reasons for Ahasuerus’s lavish banquet was his marriage to Vashti. It is said that as the king opened six treasuries, she opened six treasuries, and just as he wore ever so fancy garments, so did Vashti. According to Rashi, (famous Rabbi) every Sabbath day Vashti would take the daughters of Israel and strip them of their clothing and make them work. So therefore, it was on a Sabbath that her punishment overtook her, and for that same reason it was put into the heart of the King to ask her to do what he did. The King asked her to appear before his guests to show off her great beauty, wearing nothing but a crown. We’re talking “nothing else” here. Sorta puts meaning on the old saying, “what goes around comes around”, after the way she treated the daughters of Israel, wouldn’t you say?

Of course she refused, but not for the reasons we always thought. We thought she wouldn’t appear like that out of modesty. The reason she didn’t appear was YHVH allowed leprosy to break out on her. She couldn’t appear with that. The leprosy it is said, was punishment for her conceited manner. When King Ahasuerus sent for her, he called her Vashti the Queen, implying that her title was of secondary importance. He wanted it known that she was just a commoner who had been elevated to the throne simply because it pleased him. She, on the other hand, referred to herself as Queen Vashti, to make it known she was of royal blood, even before she came to the throne. Vashti was the daughter of Belshazzar and granddaughter of Nebuchadnezzar. When the King summoned her, she replied back with scoffing and degrading messages to him. But beginning with the first day of the King’s banquet, Mordechai and the Sanhedrin fasted and prayed for six days that YHVH would not destroy the Hebrews.

On the seventh day (Shabbat) YHVH responded to their prayers by causing Vashti’s rebellion. It is said that it was only on the merit of Ahasuerus’s future wife Esther and their son Darius, that Ahasuerus was not punished with the loss of his throne. Although you might say Vashti lost her head over the King, her wickedness caused her to be only a Queen for a day!