In this Esther 6 commentary, a sleepless King Xerxes stumbles upon a forgotten record of Mordecai’s loyalty, setting off a breathtaking chain of reversals. Haman is forced to honor the man he came to execute. Esther exposes his plot at the second banquet. And Haman is impaled on the very gallows he built for Mordecai. All within twenty-four hours.
Previously on Bible Book Club
In our last chapter, Esther stepped courageously into her role as queen and approached the king who mercifully received her and accepted her invitation to dinner. Meanwhile, Haman’s pride hit a high because he was included on the dinner invite, but the high went flat when he saw Mordecai. So his wife and advisors convinced him to build 75-foot gallows and publicly execute the man.
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Are the angels laughing out loud?
There are stories in the Bible that I imagine are vastly entertaining to the heavenly host. This is one of them. If angels are unaware of how human life plays out and watch us from above without knowledge of what will happen, then I imagine that they either laughed out loud or cheered at the turn of events in this book of Esther.
Our Esther 6 commentary begins at night.
- The construction crew is working on the gallows all night.
- Haman is still high on his dinner with the king and queen, gloating as he watches the gallows build, which may have included scaffolding.
- Esther’s servants are probably prepping for another banquet of perfection.
- Esther is no-doubt praying and playing the first banquet over and over in her mind while at the same time trying to imagine the second.
Scene 1: The Night Nobody Slept
Esther 6:1-3
That night the king could not sleep; so he ordered the book of the chronicles, the record of his reign, to be brought in and read to him. It was found recorded there that Mordecai had exposed Bigthana and Teresh, two of the king’s officers who guarded the doorway, who had conspired to assassinate King Xerxes.
“What honor and recognition has Mordecai received for this?” the king asked.
“Nothing has been done for him,” his attendants answered. (Esther 6:1-3)
Why can’t King Xerxes sleep in Esther Chapter 6?
There probably isn’t a reason why the king can’t sleep, other than God-induced insomnia. King Xerxes has a puppet-like existence. His advisors pull his strings. Haman pulls his strings. But on this night it is the unseen hand of the Lord pulling his strings, keeping him awake because he has some homework to do.
What is so humorously ironic is how contrary this is to the king we know. You would think he would call for a virgin if he couldn’t sleep. It seems to be his MO, and he has a lifetime supply of them. But instead he asks for a book. And not just any boring book, but the Book of the Chronicles, which is the official record of the Persian kings. Of all the scrolls that chronicled the king’s every move, they choose one from five years before.
What did King Xerxes find in the Book of the Chronicles?
Instead of finding sleep in his boring book, the king finds he has made a mistake he must rectify. Mordecai saved his life, and he is mortified that nothing has been done to honor him. Of all the nights in the five years since Mordecai reported that assassination attempt, this is the night the king remembers.
That one small discovery triggers a domino of reversals in the destiny of our main characters, the entire Jewish population, and ultimately our redemption in Christ.
Scene 2: The Great Reversal Begins and Suddenly It’s Morning
Esther 6:4-11
The king said, “Who is in the court?” Now Haman had just entered the outer court of the palace to speak to the king about impaling Mordecai on the pole he had set up for him.
His attendants answered, “Haman is standing in the court.”
“Bring him in,” the king ordered.
When Haman entered, the king asked him, “What should be done for the man the king delights to honor?”
Now Haman thought to himself, “Who is there that the king would rather honor than me?” So he answered the king, “For the man the king delights to honor, have them bring a royal robe the king has worn and a horse the king has ridden, one with a royal crest placed on its head. Then let the robe and horse be entrusted to one of the king’s most noble princes. Let them robe the man the king delights to honor, and lead him on the horse through the city streets, proclaiming before him, ‘This is what is done for the man the king delights to honor!'”
“Go at once,” the king commanded Haman. “Get the robe and the horse and do just as you have suggested for Mordecai the Jew, who sits at the king’s gate. Do not neglect anything you have recommended.”
So Haman got the robe and the horse. He robed Mordecai, and led him on horseback through the city streets, proclaiming before him, “This is what is done for the man the king delights to honor!” (Esther 6:4-11)
How did Haman suggest the King honor a man he delighted in?
Haman knows how Haman wants to be honored: He wants to be treated like a king for everyone to see. He doesn’t just want people to bow down to him. He wants them to see him as he sees himself. A man so close to the king that maybe he could be king. And that is exactly what he describes. It smacks of a coronation.
Of course, Haman is in the courtyard. He has been watching the build all night and cannot wait to kill Mordecai. He wants the body in the air all day for all to see. So he is at the palace at dawn, waiting for the first opportunity to sell the king on his murder plan. And Haman providentially is the only one in the courtyard. His timing is perfect, the king is up too, has been all night, and he has a question for Haman.
Why did Haman have to lead Mordecai through the city?
Of course when Haman is told the king’s question, he thinks it is about him. Because Haman thinks everything is about him. Haman can just picture it and he is ecstatic. This is going to be the best day of his life. Mordecai is going to die, and he is going to be honored like a king. He has absolutely no clue that the opposite will be true.
This is the consummate example of pride going before the fall. Haman’s downfall begins right here between the first and second feasts. You can almost imagine he could physically feel the power shift as it begins to drain from him like sand in an hourglass.
The king tells Haman to go at once.
How does Haman repeat over and over again for hours “this is what is done for the man the king delights to honor” without throwing up? Surely the angels are laughing out loud! The irony is too comical. What is Mordecai thinking? How does he hide his laughter at the situation? What about everyone else? This has to create a ripple.
- Do the nobles whisper, secretly delighted but afraid to show it?
- Are the Persians confused that maybe Mordecai is now the king’s favorite?
- Are the Jews hopeful Mordecai can influence the king?
- Does Haman become physically ill over the humiliation?
Recall the very reason Haman hates Mordecai is because he won’t bow down to him in honor. The thing Mordecai wouldn’t do for Haman, bow down, Haman has to tell others to do for Mordecai. The irony is too much. Haman spends the entire day honoring Mordecai’s life instead of gloating over his death! He will never be able to kill Mordecai now. The king will never allow it. All his plans are ruined. His enormous gallows stand 75 feet high, empty for all to see, like his future. Certainly this is the most humiliating story in the entire Bible.
Another funny thing to note is that the king tells Haman to go get Mordecai the Jew and honor him. So the king knows Mordecai is a Jew but doesn’t know or remember that he signed an edict to kill the Jews. The king is saying that Mordecai should be honored and at the same time killed. The people of Persia must be perplexed. Is the king crazy or oblivious?
Scene 3: Haman Fails to Repent
Esther 6:12-14
Afterward Mordecai returned to the king’s gate. But Haman rushed home, with his head covered in grief, and told Zeresh his wife and all his friends everything that had happened to him.
His advisers and his wife Zeresh said to him, “Since Mordecai, before whom your downfall has started, is of Jewish origin, you cannot stand against him—you will surely come to ruin!” While they were still talking with him, the king’s eunuchs arrived and hurried Haman away to the banquet Esther had prepared. (Esther 6:12-14)
What does Haman do after his day of humiliation?
Haman scurries home like the rat he is to the haven of family and friends, but this conversation is a sad contrast to the one he had just 24 hours ago. He does not boast of his invitation to dine with the queen. Instead, he confesses to the humiliation of his day.
We must give credit to Haman’s wife Zeresh. She may be equally as evil as Haman, but she sees what Haman refuses to see and tells him, “Since Mordecai, before whom your downfall has started, is of Jewish origin, you cannot stand against him.” She clearly sees his downfall has begun and that, since Mordecai is Jewish, Haman will come to ruin.
Does Haman hear the warning in her words? Or is his heart so saturated in hate and now humiliation that there is no room for repentance? As much as we despise Haman, we must keep in mind that God wants to save even the most despicable. Repentance is a choice, and God desires we make that choice.
Isaiah 55:7 Let the wicked forsake their ways and the unrighteous their thoughts. Let them turn to the Lord, and he will have mercy on them, and to our God, for he will freely pardon.
Not only does God desire our repentance, but He also delights in it.
Luke 15:7 I tell you that in the same way there will be more rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who do not need to repent.
How can we see God’s divine providence in the Book of Esther?
Despite having the power of the king at his disposal, all of Haman’s carefully laid plans are reversed just because the king can’t sleep. A lifetime career of manipulation upended by one night of insomnia. The author is teaching us that beneath the surface of all our actions is God. We cannot see Him, and we cannot control Him. But His plan will not be thwarted.
God’s Plan
In this case, God’s plan is a promise to Israel that the Messiah will come from them. That plan will hold even without miraculous battles against the enemy. Israel has sinned and is in exile. They don’t even have an army, but God doesn’t need an army. He can win a battle against the enemy just by inducing one man’s insomnia.
God’s Power
This detail about the power of divine providence eludes us. We forget that we too still have to fight battles every day.
Ephesians 6:12 For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.
We forget God can do so much more than we believe He can. Esther hoped, believed, and in between her two banquets God worked. Paul wrote this prayer for the Ephesians, but I can picture Esther praying almost the same words for herself before that second banquet believing that God will work through her for such a time as this.
Ephesians 3:14-21 For this reason I kneel before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name. I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge — that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.
Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory.
The Power of Prayer
What would God do through us if we prayed like that? I pray that out of His glorious riches he may strengthen me with power through his Spirit. I pray I have the power to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ and to know this love that surpasses knowledge. That I may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God who is able to do immeasurably more than all I ask or imagine.
Like Esther, we must embrace the fact that God wants to do immeasurably more than we can imagine. And that, in His divine providence working behind the scenes, he will build his story of redemption through the ordinary lives of individuals like us!
Scene 4: The Masks Come Off — Esther is Jewish, Haman is Evil, and the King is Furious
Esther 7:1-7
So the king and Haman went to Queen Esther’s banquet, and as they were drinking wine on the second day, the king again asked, “Queen Esther, what is your petition? It will be given you. What is your request? Even up to half the kingdom, it will be granted.”
Then Queen Esther answered, “If I have found favor with you, Your Majesty, and if it pleases you, grant me my life — this is my petition. And spare my people — this is my request. For I and my people have been sold to be destroyed, killed and annihilated. If we had merely been sold as male and female slaves, I would have kept quiet, because no such distress would justify disturbing the king.”
King Xerxes asked Queen Esther, “Who is he? Where is he — the man who has dared to do such a thing?”
Esther said, “An adversary and enemy! This vile Haman!”
Then Haman was terrified before the king and queen. The king got up in a rage, left his wine and went out into the palace garden.(Esther 7:1-7)
What did Queen Esther request from the King during the second banquet?
Esther requests her life and the life of her people. She wants to live. Esther doesn’t complain or vent about the injustice of the edict or of Haman who just happens to be sitting right there, or try to prove why it is wrong. She just wants the king to save her.
Also a brilliant move on her part: Haman, the great manipulator, has a front-row seat to watch Esther get what she wants without using any manipulation. Esther’s approach is simple and brilliant. She doesn’t just blurt out “Stop Haman, he wants to kill me!” She clearly has word-smithed her petition to perfection. Most likely she labored over the right words all day, for this would be her one shot to save thousands of lives. She has to find the right words to expose Haman without incriminating the king who has, after all, approved the decree of death. Esther builds her case methodically, and she begins with something she excels at: favor and humble deference. She says: If she has found favor, if it pleases the king.
Esther’s position is not enviable. She is intimately subject to a volatile, ill-advised king. But rather than be bitter about it, she works with it. She humbly adds that she wouldn’t have bothered the king if they had only been sold as slaves. But this is genocide. Slavery was legal in Persia, although the Jews had been released from slavery when Cyrus conquered the Babylonians.
How did Esther expose Haman’s plot to King Xerxes?
Esther humbly makes her request in deference to what pleases the king, which is psychologically brilliant because the king has made it clear his pleasure is a priority, especially when it comes to women. Then she states her request in the simplest, most reasonable terms.
At this point, the king probably sits up in alarm. Wait, what? Somebody is trying to kill the queen. Now she has his attention in the best possible way. A royal murder is a serious subject for a king who receives regular assassination attempts.
Then Esther gives the barest of details: She has been sold along with her people to die. No mention of an edict, Haman, or the king. Note she uses the word “sold.” This is more proof the king really did take the silver from Haman, even though he told Haman to keep it.
Can you imagine the king’s indignation at her suggestion that she wouldn’t have bothered him if she were being sold into slavery? Let alone killed. His queen a slave?
If the request had not come from his lovely, calm, no drama queen, he probably would have laughed and said, what are you talking about? You are crazy. But this is Esther, the one woman who has found favor with everyone. The woman who eased the pain of his humiliation after the defeat against Greece. The woman who never gave him a moment of trouble. She wouldn’t have come to him if it weren’t important. He can trust that she is not making this up.
Why did King Xerxes leave the room after Esther exposed Haman?
King Xerxes is in a quandary, and he needs to think. He has blindly, foolishly played a part in this: blindly approving the decree and foolishly promoting Haman to Prime Minister, giving him too much power. And now his Prime Minister has deceived him into signing a death warrant for his own wife.
How would this look? He has already banished one queen. He is at risk of killing another. The word will get out, and the world will know. The king has to save face, and he has to save Esther. But how can he accuse Haman of a plot he himself approved? He has to find a way to pronounce Haman guilty without implicating himself. But what else doesn’t he know? He didn’t even know his wife was Jewish. Had Haman known Esther was Jewish? Esther didn’t say.
I am sure the King’s mind is racing. If Haman knows Esther is Jewish, perhaps Haman intentionally created the edict to kill the Jews as some sort of conspiracy against the queen and even himself. Haman may have even been a part of the assassination attempt that Mordecai uncovered.
And Mordecai, also a Jew, was just honored. How is that going to look? Honored one day and killed the next all through the orders of the king. This is so messy! The king must have been irrationally frustrated and angry. And so he heads back into the room probably to get more answers or maybe just to roll some heads. Fortunately, or shall I say providentially, God gives the king a way to save face and execute Haman at the same time.
Scene 5: Haman Loses Control and Loses His Life
Esther 7:8-10
But Haman, realizing that the king had already decided his fate, stayed behind to beg Queen Esther for his life.
Just as the king returned from the palace garden to the banquet hall, Haman was falling on the couch where Esther was reclining.
The king exclaimed, “Will he even molest the queen while she is with me in the house?”
As soon as the word left the king’s mouth, they covered Haman’s face. 9 Then Harbona, one of the eunuchs attending the king, said, “A pole reaching to a height of fifty cubits[b] stands by Haman’s house. He had it set up for Mordecai, who spoke up to help the king.”
The king said, “Impale him on it!”So they impaled Haman on the pole he had set up for Mordecai.Then the king’s fury subsided.
Why did King Xerxes think Haman was molesting Queen Esther?
When the king returns to the dining room, Haman is on the Queen’s couch, probably holding onto her in fear for his life. From the king’s perspective, any touching of the queen is a sexual assault and an excuse to execute. And that is what the king needs.
In the Persian Court, touching or approaching the queen without permission is forbidden. The queen’s body is sacred and the king’s property. No one is allowed within seven steps of any woman from the harem.
Haman Loses Control
Haman has approached Esther in desperation for his life. He fell on her couch, grabbing at his only chance for mercy. This is ironic. Think about what started this entire story: Haman was furious because Mordecai, a Jewish man, would not bow down to him. And now Haman is prostrate before Esther, a Jewish woman, begging for his life.
Haman, the man who carefully crafted his rise to Prime Minister, has lost control, which is also ironic and presents a sharp contrast to Esther. Esther exercised great control when pleading for her life, adhering to all the laws about approaching the king. Haman loses control when pleading for his life, violating all the strict Persian laws about the queen.
The King Knows the Truth
The king knows that Haman is not molesting the queen. There are people in the room, and the situation is not one for physical conquests. But the king has no desire to be merciful. Haman has used the king and tried to kill the queen. And now the king uses the law to kill Haman. The king’s quandary is solved. Haman will be dead before the sun goes down, and the king will blame the whole edict on Haman.
Haman’s face, now considered an object the king cannot see because it causes displeasure, is covered, and he is carried away. Then a eunuch steps forward with an ironic detail, and the king learns of the gallows built by Haman for Mordecai. So the king commands the death of Haman on his very own gallows.
The eunuchs know everything, and God uses them well in this story. From Hegai to Hathak to Harbona, they have been valuable pawns in this chess game.
What happens to Haman at the end of Esther Chapter 7?
Haman is executed on the very gallows he builds for Mordecai, hung 75 feet in the air for all of Susa to see. Just like that, it’s over. The man who woke up that morning expecting to parade Mordecai through the streets as a condemned criminal is dead by sunset. From the king’s favorite advisor to a corpse on display in less than 24 hours.
The gallows Haman built became his own memorial. The plot he devised became his own judgment. The pride that drove him became the thing that destroyed him. Haman’s pride led to Haman’s destruction.
Proverbs 16:18 Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall.
That is the hidden hand of God orchestrating perfect justice while never speaking a single word. God moved a king’s heart through insomnia. He positioned a queen through courage. He exposed a villain through timing so precise it could only be divine. And He delivered His people through ordinary people doing extraordinary things at exactly the right moments.
But not everything has been resolved. There’s one massive problem still hanging over them, literally written into Persian law and sealed with the king’s signet ring.
Can Persian law be revoked after Haman’s death?
Persian law cannot be revoked. Ever. So even though Haman is dead, his edict is still very much alive. In just a few months, every Persian citizen has legal permission to kill every Jewish man, woman, and child in the empire.
Esther and Mordecai may have won the battle, but the war? We will have to read about the war in our next chapter.
Group Discussion Questions for Esther Chapters 6–7
- The king’s insomnia was the hidden hand of God moving the story. Have you ever noticed God using sleepless nights or unexpected conversations to lead you?
- Paul prayed that God would do “immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine.” What would change in your life if you prayed that prayer and truly believed it?
- Esther spent time carefully choosing the right words before a difficult conversation. Are you someone who plans out what you’re going to say, or do you tend to just wing it? Do you think God can work in both?
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