Narrative Lectionary Key Verse for Today
“By these letters the king allowed the Jews who were in every city to assemble and defend their lives, to destroy, to kill, and to annihilate any armed force of any people or province that might attack them, with their children and women, and to plunder their goods on a single day throughout all the provinces of King Ahasuerus, on the thirteenth day of the twelfth month, which is the month of Adar.”
NL Daily Devotion for Saturday, December 10, 2022
by R. M. Fergus, Clergy Stuff
Okay, so the end of the play is a little over the top. Rather than simply rescinding the order to kill the Jewish people, or making it a crime to oppress them, the King makes another decree allowing the Jews to defend themselves by killing their attackers and to plunder the area willy nilly. I suppose it is a melodrama, so that a melodramatic ending is called for, but I’m no fan of violence, especially when it could be so easily prevented.
On the other hand, I have deep sympathy for communities who have been so oppressed for so long that when something catalyzes mass protests, violence erupts. It’s not that I think rioting and looting are good things in and of themselves, but they are completely understandable when you look honestly at the history of brutal injustice that has been used to keep BIPOC communities down.
There’s nothing comedic about that sort of oppression and violence. But in reality there wasn’t much to laugh about for the Jewish people who originally performed Esther—a people with a long history of being hated, feared, conquered, and oppressed, much of which continues to this day. Maybe it was cathartic for them to imagine being given complete freedom to act out their pain and rage in a visceral way. Who knows. All I can tell you is that this farcical production comes to its happy ending—Esther saves her people from destruction and they celebrated from that day on with the festival of Purim.
Is violence ever justified? Why or why not?