As we celebrate Purim the most essential mitzvah is hearing Megillas Esther. You are supposed to hear it twice, you have to hear every word, it must be read from a scroll of parchment with ink, it has blessings before and after, etc. None of the other rabbinic holidays have a reading that is so important. Not Chanukah, not Tisha B’Av, not Lag B’Omer. The obvious question is what makes Purim different? But I actually think there’s a more important question. Why is it called Megillas Esther? Why is Mordechai not included in the title as well?

Mordechai and Esther wrote it together. Mordechai is a very important part of the story, if not for him Haman may not have made his decree or suffered his ultimate fate. And it is Mordechai that urges Esther to go in to confront King Achashveirosh. Why not call it Megillas Mordechai and Esther? 

The Gemara in Megillah (7a) actually discusses why Purim became a holiday at all. After everything had transpired Esther sent a message to Sages of the time and said, “Establish me for generations.” What does that mean? Rashi comments that “Establish me” meant make this event into a Yom Tov (holiday) and a kriah (reading) and it should be a name for me.The Sages responded, No, this will arouse the wrath of the nations upon us (because the story publicizes the victory of the Jews over the gentiles, that will provoke antisemitism.)

Esther comes back with, “I’m already written about in the chronicles of the kings of Media and Persia. (Meaning the story is already known by the gentiles. At least let us tell our side of the story.) And so the Sages agreed. That wasn’t enough for Esther. She wrote to the sages again saying, “Write me for generations.” (Meaning include this Megillah in the canon of Jewish liturgy, include it in Tanakh) The Sages disputed her request but ultimately agreed that it was Divinely inspired and ultimately canonized. And according to Rashi, it is because of her perseverance with the Sages to establish the holiday, that is why she gets her namesake credited.  

But why was this so important to her? Why is she so emphatic about HER NAME being highlighted? Is she consumed with getting fame and honor? Let’s talk about Esther’s name. In Chullin 139b, the Gemara asks, “From where in the Torah do we find an allusion to Esther?” It answers with a verse from Devarim (31:17-18)

And I will hide [haster astir] My face on that day for all the evil which they shall have wrought, in that they are turned to other gods.”  

The verse uses haster astir, a double usage of the word esther (meaning to hide). But because the language is doubled, it describes an intense or doubling of the concept. A concealment of a concealment. The Baal Shem Tov comments on the phrase haster astir saying that Hashem is so hidden people stop looking for Him. This both refers to Esther as her name, but also the situation of the time. For the first time in history a decree was issued about destroying ALL Jews. With the expanse of Achashveirosh’s power (127 kingdoms) there was nowhere for any Jew to go. 

As hopeless as it seemed for the Jews at the time, Esther lived through a darker concealment. She was already an orphan who then was taken from the only guardian she had ever known and into the clutches of a tyrannical, wife-murdering, idolatrous, and clearly sex obsessed king.  She’s chosen as his queen and has to resist his advances in any way she can. She shuts down, she becomes evasive, and she resists so much that King Achashveirosh forsakes her. She is truly alone. 

So when Mordechai urges her to go to the King and plead for the Jewish people, Esther faces an even darker fate. On one hand, if she enters the King’s inner chamber without being summoned, King Achashveirosh will instantly have her killed. She writes to Mordechai “I will go to the king contrary to the law, and if I perish, I perish.” But if the king doesn’t kill her, her response to Mordechai implies a fate worse than death. 

By some opinions Esther and Mordechai were married. Up until this point, Esther has resisted the King’s advances. But if she goes to King Achashveirosh, there is an implication that she will accept his advances willingly. When she says “I will go to the king contrary to the law,” some say she’s not talking about Shushan Law, she’s talking about the Torah. Being with King Achashveirosh willingly will be a transgression of sexual immorality (gilui arayos – one of the three cardinal sins) and will forever forbid her to Mordechai. She will once and for all be cut off from her family and lose the last shred of her spiritual connection. 

Psalm 22:2 reads, “Eli Eli lama azavtani,” “My God, my God, why have You forsaken me?” The Gemara in Megillah 15b says that the Psalm actually quotes Esther as she cried out to Hashem just before entering King Achashveirosh’s inner chamber. “Rabbi Levi said: Once she reached the chamber of the idols the Divine Presence left her and she said, “Eli Eli lama azavtani.” 

She’s in a lose-lose situation and now she has lost the spiritual guidance, the only thing she had in the darkness. But then the most amazing thing happens. This meek, submissive, passive girl suddenly becomes the most brilliant strategist. She doesn’t reveal her lineage to King Achashveirosh, she uses mystery, Achashveirosh’s paranoia, and Haman’s ego to flip the script and save the Jewish people. 

Though the feeling of spiritual connection leaves Esther, in actuality she embodies that spiritual connection and enacts Hashem’s Will herself. Her actions reveal that when you feel alone, you’re not actually alone. In fact, you have the opportunity to make the deepest connection with Hashem possible. When it seems there is no salvation and you take it upon yourself to become the salvation, you become the embodiment of Hashem’s Shechinah. 

The Megillah comes from the word giluy, which means reveal. Esther means “the presence of the Shechinah is concealed.” So the name Megillas Esther is literally a contradiction, an oxymoron even! The Revelation of Concealment. But in that contradiction is the deeper truth. When Hashem is concealed, when you are in darkness and surrounded by impurity and shame and hopelessness, that’s when you can reveal Hashem in the most profound way. 

Esther cried out, “Eli Eli lama azavtani,” “My God, my God, why have You forsaken me?” That very outreach to Hashem, when He seems to have abandoned you, is the key to the revelation. When we feel defeated and in despair, it is so easy to throw it all away. What’s the point in keeping Shabbos if I can’t find a job? What am I resting from? What’s the point in following the mitzvahs of modesty or physical affection when I can’t find a spouse? And for the Jews at the beginning of the Purim story, what’s the point in keeping our Judaism when the Temple never got rebuilt. However, in the face of darkest concealment Esther revealed Hashem not from Earth-shattering plagues or reality bending miracles, but in the manner the modern era would require. By searching for Him behind the scenes, in retrospect seeing how it all worked out, and by believing in yourself to do the right thing because Hashem not only believes in you, He has trusted you to be His emissary to do His Will. 

Mordechai faced danger, but not doubt. He put himself in harm’s way opposing Haman, but he did so because he had such clarity. He was the head of the Jewish supreme court! It was Esther who had to risk everything while living in darkness with little chance of seeing any light at the end of her tunnel. The Jews of that generation and of today needed to know that it is never hopeless. No Jew is ever too far, too “impure”, or too hopeless that they can’t reveal Hashem’s Shechinah in the most powerful ways possible. That is why it is called Megillas Esther.

This post was inspired by Rabbi YY Jacobson’s class The Untold Purim Story: The First Female Abuse Victim Who Dared to Speak Out. Please listen to it for deeper understanding.