The glory of the united kingdom of Israel, described in the last chapter, in a few years departed as a dream of the night. It was rent in twain, and Ahab, the wicked king, was on the throne of the northern kingdom, with the seat of government in Samaria. He had married Jezebel, the daughter of Ethbaal, King of Sidon, and she had introduced into the kingdom of Israel the heathen abominations of the Sidonians. She had even torn down God’s altars, and persecuted his prophets to the death. And it seems that too many of the Israelites raised little or no protests against these wicked acts of Jezebel. Indeed, one of the reasons why the kingdom, after the death of Solomon, was wrenched from Rehoboam, his son, was the people worshipped Ashtoreth, the goddess of the Sidonians.

So grievous had these abominations of the Sidonians become, that God was about to visit the nation with judgment. But, as He always sends warnings, and gives a season to repent, so he sent Elijah, the Tishbite, from the hill country of Gilead down to Ahab in Samaria, with this message, “As the Lord God of Israel liveth, before whom I stand, there shall not be dew nor rain these years, but according to my word.” And James tells us, “it rained not upon the earth for the space of three years and six months.”

During these years of famine, the Lord directed Elijah to a widow in Sarepta, after the waters of the brook of Cherith had dried up. Sarepta (or Zarephath) was a city of Phœnicia. But the distress of the famine in Israel was felt even here, for Israel was the great grain field for Phœnicia. And this explains why Elijah, when he came to the city gate of Sarepta, found a poor woman, a widow, gathering a few sticks, that she might bake the last morsel of bread and share it with her child, after which there was nothing more to hope for. The famine was doing its awful work among the cities of the coast. The hills back of Sarepta were scorched, and the beautiful valleys on either side of the city were cracked in great fissures. In her distress this widow, in her person had wasted to a skeleton, faltering, trembling, as she staggered out to gather a few sticks to bake her last cake for self and child, and then to die. Her cheeks were sunken, her eyes hollow, and her nerves seem never to have known what rest meant. As she walked she staggered; when she stood she reeled. She was leaning against her gate, the sticks in her arms when the Tishbite saluted her with the request, “Fetch me, I pray thee, a drink of water.”

In a moment she was going toward her water pot. “Bring me, I pray thee, a morsel of bread in thy hand,” the prophet called after her while on the way to get the water.

“Bread!” Distressed and sorely tried, the poor woman breaks down, and discloses the sad condition of her home in the ever-memorable words, “As the Lord thy God liveth, I have not a cake, but a handful of meal in a barrel and a little oil in a cruse, and behold, I am gathering two sticks that I may go and dress it for me and my son, that we may eat it and die.”

She may or she may not have been an Israelite. She may have been one of the seven thousand who had not bowed unto Baal, and possibly knew who it was who addressed her. At all events she must have heard of this “lighted fire-brand, fallen out of the clouds, and hurled by the hand of Jehovah” at the wicked Ahab. She may even have heard that in the midst of the drought Ahab had divided the country between himself and Obadiah, to seek if possible, amidst its former fountains and brooks a little “grass to save his horses and mules alive,” though it did not matter to this hardened wretch of a king if his subjects died by the thousands. So this demand of Elijah must have been a real trial to her faith. Nor did her distressed condition change the demand of the Tishbite. “Do as thou hast said,” he commanded, “but bake me a little cake first!” What, serve this stranger from Gilead before her starving child? Surely how could she, with her mother heart, obey such an order? But, noble woman, staggering under the request, she placed the gathered sticks on the fire, went to the barrel and took out the last handful of meal, and poured the last drop of oil from the cruse, and baked for God’s prophet the cake, and served him first! Was there ever such unselfish self-surrender? But for her poverty and her appearance, she might have passed for an angel who had strayed away from heaven, got caught in the famine and could not find her way back. If God had not been behind this exorbitant demand of the prophet it had been simply heartless. But, along with the demand were the words, “for the Lord God of Israel hath said it.” If God said it, that was the end of all questionings, this angel in human form, reduced in her poverty, staggered off to meet the demand. There may have been no small stir in heaven when it became known that she had gone to bake her last cake for the man of God, and then to die without tasting it herself. If the jasper walls had that moment let down around her, and all the glorified had gathered about that oven, she would have felt perfectly at home without a change of raiment. But that “last cake” was never baked. As the trembling widow stood by the heated oven, in sublime obedience to God’s requirement, even as Abraham once stood by his altar fires on Moriah, with the bound Isaac upon it, there came the gracious “Fear not!” She had gone to a point in her faith where God always breaks down. He saw it all, and out of divine compassion He answered, “The barrel of meal shall not waste, neither shall the cruse of oil fail, until the day that the Lord sendeth rain upon the earth.” And the record goes on to say that she, and the prophet, and her house, had enough through the years of the famine. There was so much meal and oil that even the widow’s poor and starving relations came to partake thereof. That is the way God blesses—it always overflows upon others.

How this incident at Sarepta glorifies God, whom the Scripture teaches us to know in His unapproachable greatness and in His affable mercy and condescension! As we sat by the little brook in Sarepta, amid the noontide glow of an Oriental sun, and read afresh this charming story, and then raised our eyes to look on the little chapel which the crusaders had erected on the reputed site of the widow’s home, the thought of such a God flooded us with His precious nearness, for, in our human needs, we love to feel His comforting presence in our hearts. The Jehovah, the Almighty God, the maker of worlds, the ruler of systems beyond human vision, whose perfect will is done in heaven by angels, who holdeth the dew of heaven, the rain in the clouds, the waters of the oceans in His hands, who gives and withholds the needed bread and water, He is our Father, and exercises a father’s care, so that the individual is not forgotten of Him. He holds not only the whole, but the single parts; He looks not only into the palace of kings, but into the cottages of poverty. The need and misery of a poor widow are not too insignificant for Him; He observes her sighs and tears, and her silent, desolate cottage is for Him a place worthy of the revelation of His glory and goodness.

Matchless widow of Sarepta! As long as the name of Elijah lives, with its imperishable renown, so long shall thine be found side by side with it in the unfading annals of the church of God!

But our story runs on. The wicked Ahab had died, and Jehoram, his son, reigned in his stead. The great hero, prophet of the kingdom of the ten tribes, had also passed over the Jordan, and somewhere among the valleys, overshadowed by the lofty dome of Nebo, the “chariot of fire and horses of fire” came down and translated the first and greatest of the prophets. His mantle, however, fell upon Elisha, the son of Shaphat. Elisha had scarcely returned from the land of Moab, whither he had gone to relieve the armies of Jehoshaphat, king of Judah, out of the horrors of a water famine, when there met him a certain widow of the wives of the sons of the prophets, and cried unto him in her distress. Of what particular prophet she was the widow the record does not state, nor is her name given. Josephus and the rabbis will have it that she was the widow of Obadiah, who, they think, had exhausted his fortune in the provision for the persecuted prophets in the time of the drought, in the reign of Ahab, when, faithful to God, amidst the splendors of Ahab’s corrupt court, he hid such of the prophets as escaped out of the hands of Jezebel, the wicked queen, hid them in caves, feeding them on bread and water through the sore distress of the three years’ famine, and so had fallen into debt, basing their claim upon the woman’s statement that her husband “feared the Lord,” which is also stated in respect to Obadiah. But whether she was the widow of Obadiah or not, she was greatly in need, and, in her distress, appealed to Elisha, who was the acknowledged head of the prophetic school.

But what a calamity had come into her widowhood! Her husband had not only been taken from her by death, but now, after bravely struggling to provide for her family, the creditors had come to take her two sons to be bondsmen. If that will not touch a mother’s heart we do not know what will. And so she hastens away to relieve her burdened heart in the ears of the sympathizing prophet. He listened to her story, and then asked, “What hast thou in the house?”

What a question to ask a mother whose sons were about to be sold into slavery for debts! What could she have of value she would not gladly dispose of to save her children?

She answered, “Thine handmaid hath not anything in the house!” Not anything? Oh yes, there is “a pot of oil.” She was in a more deplorable condition than the widow of Sarepta, for she, aside from the cruse of oil, had a “handful of meal.” But this one was entirely destitute, even of the oil so essential in the preparation of food—she had only a little pot for anointing purposes. But even this was enough for God and faith to work on.

“Go,” said Elisha, “borrow thee vessels abroad of all thy neighbors, even empty vessels; borrow not a few.” Comforted in her heart, she went home and told her anxious sons what the prophet had said. “It is vessels you want, is it mother?” “Yes,” she answered, the prophet said, “borrow not a few!”

So all that morning, and far into the afternoon, the widow’s sons were calling on their neighbors for empty vessels, crocks, great waterpots, casks, firkins, in short, anything that would hold oil. As the boys were going empty-handed down the streets and returning loaded with vessels, the people began to wonder what that poor widow of the prophet should want of so many vessels, especially as it was known that she had nothing in her house. But the boys kept at their work until every neighbor was borrowed empty, and her house looked more like a depot for freight, than a poor woman’s cottage. All the rooms were filled, the open court was filled, and all the approaches were filled. The widow’s sons, if their industry in borrowing and carrying home vessels would save them from being sold into slavery, they certainly would escape out of the hands of their mother’s creditor, for was there ever such a sight of empty vessels! And not until there were no more to be borrowed did they cease from their work.

And now the supreme moment came. The prophet had told her, after the vessels were all in, she should shut the door upon herself and upon her sons. Only her boys should be witnesses to the mighty deliverances of God. The locking of the door had no other object than to keep aloof every interruption from without. The action in question was not an ordinary, simply external, operation, but an act which was to be performed by the command of the man of God, and with the heart directed towards God, that is, in faith, so that it was to be completed, not in the noise and distraction of everyday life, but in quietness and solitude. And we may also well believe she first asked God’s blessing upon her undertaking, so far carried on in faith, for though her house was full of vessels, they were all as yet empty.

The prayer ended, she took down her ointment jar—and Oh, it was such a very little pot! Holding it in her hand, she told her oldest son to bring one of the smallest jars, for how could the little vessel in her hand fill even the smallest of the borrowed utensils? As she tipped the little pot, the golden stream began to flow, and it kept on flowing until the vessel was filled to the brim, to the utter astonishment of herself and sons. This one filled, another was quickly brought. And as the oil flowed, the poor woman’s faith grew, and the sweat was now rolling down the faces of her sons as they brought up the empty vessels, and removed the full ones. Her face fairly shone as she filled the last vessel, and in her excitement cried out, “Bring me yet a vessel!” “Why, mother,” both the sons speaking at once, “there is not a vessel more!” So when the last was filled to the brim, “the oil stayed.”

As she looked over the sea of vessels all filled to the brim with golden oil, out of the gladness of her heart she hastened to tell Elisha what had happened at her house. She had oil in her vessels and thanksgiving in her heart, and she must tell it out, and who was better prepared to share her joy than the prophet who had listened to the story of her distress.

And he said, “Go, sell the oil, and pay thy debt.” The religion that comes from heaven looks well after its creditors. The debt was paid, her sons were spared to her, and a surplus was left for them to live upon.

What a beautiful lesson of faith! We suppose if any of her neighbors had known that all these empty borrowed vessels were for the purpose of experimenting with a little pot of anointing oil, it would have created a sensation. Some, doubtless, would have said, the creditor, in threatening to take her sons, has driven that poor widow out of her mind. Why, such a thing as filling these pots, and firkins, and great casks of ten and fifteen gallon capacity, with a little pot of oil has never been heard of in Israel, and we can’t understand who could have put such an absurd idea into the poor woman’s head. Indeed, there was good reason for shutting the world out, for, if they had seen her take down the little pot of oil and attempted to pour into the vessels, they would have laughed her to scorn. But then, we Christian people should know that the things which are impossible with men, are perfectly possible with God. Yea, He loves to multiply the impossibilities of men, that no flesh may glory in His presence.

Then also the number of vessels borrowed speak well for the faith of this woman. Our Lord tells us, over and over, according to our faith shall it be done unto us. If her faith had been small, and she had been content with a few vessels, the oil would have ceased to flow when the last vessel was filled. If our heavenly Father is ever pleased with the action of His earthly children, it must be over the audacious faith of a poor woman who, in her poverty and distress, borrows of her neighbors empty vessels for Him to fill out of His gracious benevolence.

But not all women, in the time of the prophets, were widows and poor, but even the rich needed the consolations God only can give in times of trouble. And so our story runs on from the widow of Sarepta and the widow who, in her extremity, appealed to Elisha, to the rich woman of Shunem.

Over against Jezreel, under the base of Jebel Duhy (the so-called “Little Hermon”) amid luxuriant gardens of lemon, orange and fig trees, which cast their refreshing shades over the hot and sultry bridle-path, is the village of Sulem, in which we recognize the ancient Shunem, rendered so dear to every lover of the Bible by the beautiful, sweet story of the rich Shunammite woman who prepared a prophet’s chamber in her house, where Elisha often found a shelter from the oppressive heat of the noontide sun as he passed that way.

The little city, in the division of the land, under Joshua, was allotted to the tribe of Issachar, and is three miles north of Jezreel, five miles from Mount Gilboa, about four miles from Nain, where our Lord raised the widow’s son, and is in full view of the sacred spot on Mount Carmel. In the southern section of the village, at the base of the hill Moreh, flows out a transparent stream of sparkling water, which renders the fields green and beautiful, said to be the finest in the world.

Amid these enchanting and picturesque scenes lived the Shunammite. The Bible gives her no name. She needs none. She is simply “a great woman.” Standing in her doorway, in three directions, she could look out over the fields of grain, and see the slow movements of the heavily loaded camels drudge up from the seaport of Acre, or down through the great plain of Esdraelon from the mountains of Naphtali or the hill country of Gilead, beyond the Jordan. If Elisha came from Carmel, he would approach Shunem by the Acre road. Accompanied by Gehazi, one of the sons of the prophets, she could see them trudging along the dusty camel path at a great distance, and she said to her husband, “Behold now, I perceive that this is an holy man of God.” So much for the personal appearance of Elisha. He carried a good face, which commended itself even to this discerning woman. Prompted by the manly bearing of the prophet, he had scarcely reached the gate when she stood before him, and pointing to her home, “she constrained him to eat bread.”

It appears that Elisha passed frequently through Shunem. No doubt Carmel, which lay in the middle of the northern part of the kingdom, was the place where the faithful worshippers of Jehovah, who lived in the north, came together from time to time, and were strengthened in their faith, and instructed by the prophet. This would call Elisha to pass up from Carmel to Shunem and the north. “And so it was, that as oft as he passed by, he turned in thither to eat bread.” Happy household! Most gracious hospitality! That sweet home, amid the olive groves of Shunem, ever afterwards became the resting place of the good Elisha.

The pious, but keen-sighted woman, who at the first recognized in Elisha “an holy man of God,” was not deceived or disappointed when she became more fully acquainted with him in his frequent stops. Indeed, she must have been very favorably impressed with his bearing, for she proposed to enlarge her hospitality. She said to her husband, “Let us make a little chamber, I pray thee, on the wall,” that is, upon the flat roof of the house, with walls which would be a protection against storms, “and let us set for him there a bed, and a table, and a stool and a candlestick.” Beautiful and thoughtful provision. In such a room Elisha would be protected from every interruption, such as it was hardly possible to avoid entirely in the house, and there he might pass his time in quietness.

Elisha wished to make some return to his hostess, who had received and entertained him so liberally and so often, but he did not know what would be acceptable to her a woman of wealth. In order to learn this, he does not address himself directly to her, but directs his servant to ask the necessary questions, that she may express herself with less embarrassment and less reserve. He asks, “What is to be done for thee? Wouldest thou be spoken for to the king, or to the captain of the host?” This question presupposes that Elisha at that time stood in favor and respect at court. The king, in this instance may have referred to Jehu, whom Elisha caused to be anointed. The commander of the army is named in connection with the king as the most powerful and most influential man at court.

This excellent woman sent a most beautiful reply to the prophet. “And she answered, I dwell among my own people.” She asks no recompense for the good she had done. She wishes to have nothing to do with the court of the king, and the great ones of the world. She had no favors to ask, and desired no political honors. Hers was a contented life. Perhaps, in this reply, she wished to show, at the same time, that she had not entertained the prophet for the sake of any return, but for his own sake, and for the sake of God. She had received him in the name of a prophet, and not for the sake of a reward, or any temporal gain. She loved God, and therefore loved His servant, and she showed him kindness, because this was the law God had written upon her heart. Although she lacked that which was essential to the honor and happiness of an Israelitish wife, namely, a son, yet she was contented, and no word of complaint passed her lips—a sign of great humility and modesty.

But the noble-hearted Elisha could not endure the thought of receiving all these favors without making some return, and he felt all the more bound to do something for her. To be barren, in those days, was regarded as a disgrace, so the prophet summoned her into his presence. But out of modesty and respect she only came to the door. Elisha announced to her that her home is to be blessed in the birth of a son. There were the disabilities of nature, and the woman regarded the announcement as improbable of realization, and, in true Oriental language, replied, “Nay, my lord, thou man of God, do not lie unto thine handmaid,” that is, do not deceive me, by exciting vain hopes in me. The Lord, however, according to His grace and truth, remembers even the desires which we cherish in silence, as no doubt this woman had done, but did not express, and He often gives to those who yield to His holy will without murmurs or complaints just that which they no longer dared to hope for. It makes a great difference whether we doubt of the divine promises from unbelief, or from humility or want of confidence in ourselves, because we consider the promises too great and glorious, and ourselves unworthy of them.

But God remembered this noble woman of Shunem, who had shown such kindness to His servant, and, according to the promise, a son was born into the great woman’s home. A ray of sunshine had indeed broken through the parted clouds and entered that home—sunshine such as had never been there before, and such as outshone all her estates.

Below the village, stretching away towards the south and east, were the wheatfields, and the child, as children sometimes will, slipped out from under the mothers watchful care, into the field where the reapers were at work. Absorbed in the work of the reapers, neither the father nor the son realized the intense heat pouring down out of a clear sky upon the field at the hottest season of the year. Presently, this child of promise, which had gladdened the hearts of his parents and brought such joy and sunshine to their home, came up to his father and said, “My head, my head.”

It was scarcely barley harvest when we crossed this plain with the glare of the sun out of a clear sky shining in our face, and with blood heated and thirsty withal, and the danger of a sun-stroke, we thought of the words of the child, and ever since they have had a new meaning. At once the father directed a lad to carry the child “to his mother,” and when the lad had brought him “he sat on her knees till noon, and then died.” All the mother’s hope turned to ashes, and her joy into grief, made all the more bitter because it was her only child. As she sat in her house with the dead child folded to her bosom, her soul cried out: “What is life?” Though passing fair, it is but as

The grief-smitten mother carried the body of her precious child into the upper chamber and tenderly laid it on the “bed of the man of God, and shut the door upon it.” Doubtless, for the present, she intended to keep the death of the child from the husband and father. Evidently she cherished the secret hope that the prophet, who had promised her a son in the name of Jehovah, and had not deceived her, could help to restore him. At all events she acted promptly. She called her husband to send a young man out of the field to make ready with all haste to go to Mount Carmel, and when ready she said to the servant, “Drive, and go forward; slack not thy riding for me, except I bid thee.”

Elisha, from his outlook on mount Carmel, saw a cloud of dust in the plain of Esdraelon, and he called the attention of Gehazi to the flying figures at the head of it. On swept the riders over the plain. Elisha once more put his hand up to shade his eyes from the glare of the sun, and said, “Behold, it is the Shunammite; run now,” and ask, “Is it well with thee? is it well with thy husband? is it well with the child?” By sending his servant to meet her, Elisha showed how highly he esteemed this woman. However, to the salutation of Gehazi, she returned only the short, indefinite answer, “It is well,” in order, doubtless, not to be detained by further explanations. She would at once hasten to the prophet himself. When she came near him, overcome by grief, which she had repressed until then, she threw herself at his feet, in the manner of Orientals, and sobbed out her great sorrow, at the same time imploring his assistance. Gehazi could not understand it. He thought her conduct in clasping his master’s feet an offence against his dignity, and “came near to thrust her away.” But Elisha said, “Let her alone.” Give the poor grief-stricken woman a chance to compose herself and to tell her trouble.

Presently, the stricken mother called the prophet’s attention to his own promise, meaning to say thereby, I did not complain of my childlessness, and did not demand a son; now, however, I am grief-smitten, for it is better never to have a child than to have one and lose it.

The grief and the lamentation of the woman moved the compassionate heart of the prophet so much that he desired to bring her relief as soon as possible. He therefore said to Gehazi, “Gird up thy loins, and take my staff in thine hand and go thy way; if thou meet any man, salute him not.” This shows that he was to go as quickly as possible. He was even to refrain from saluting any one. It is well known that salutations are far more ceremonious in the Orient than with us, and inferiors always remain standing until persons of higher rank pass by, and thus annoying delay was often occasioned. This command to hasten would draw off the attention of the mother from her excessive grief, and, possibly, Elisha may have hoped that life had not yet entirely left the child, and that utter decease might yet be prevented by swift interference. But the importunity of the woman, that Elisha himself should come, proceeded from the conviction that the child was already completely dead, and that now not Gehazi, but only the prophet himself, who had promised her the son, could help. To this deep confidence he promptly responded.

Gehazi carried out his commission by hastening on to Shunem, and placing the prophet’s staff upon the face of the child, and, by means of the divine power, of which the staff was the symbol, he was to execute a prophetical act in awakening the child out of the death-sleep.

Before Elisha, with the sorrowing mother, arrived at Shunem, Gehazi had discharged his commission, although in vain, and was on his way back again, when he met the prophet, and said, “The child is not awaked.” Though he had the external symbol of the prophet’s power, yet it lacked the spirit of Jehovah, which was the special gift of God, and which even Elisha might not delegate, according to his own will and pleasure, to his servant.

The want of success of Gehazi’s commission spurred on the prophet all the more to do what he could in order to restore the child to life. Having reached the house of sorrow, and the little chamber where the loving hands of the mother had laid the body of her child, Elisha shut the door, and “prayed unto the Lord.” In that awful hour of a mother’s heart-crushing suspense, God heard His servant’s cry, and gave back the precious child to life again.

The closing scene is very beautiful indeed. The mother having been called, when she reached the chamber, Elisha said, “Take up thy son!” We are not told whether the mother heart first leaped to embrace the child, or, out of modest gratitude, she first fell at the prophet’s feet in a flood of grateful thanksgiving. The bread of kindness she had been casting upon the waters, in honoring God’s servant, now all returned to her. She certainly was reaping with tears of joy, and, had she lived in this gospel age, she could have heard the Lord of life saying, “Inasmuch as ye did it to one of these My servants, ye did it unto Me.” Marvels of marvels, that prophets’ homes do not dot our land in this day of gospel light.

Immortal woman of Shunem! Home-builder for the prophets of the Lord; the saints in glory salute thee to-day, and the saints on earth are thrilled with thy worthy example. There is scarcely a story in the Old Testament which is more beautiful than the one related of this “great woman” in White Raiment, who built a prophet’s chamber in her own house at Shunem, where the servant of the Lord might turn in out of the glare of the noontide sun and find rest.

From the incidents connected with the beautiful life of the rich woman of Shunem, to the time of Queen Esther, there is a period of about four hundred years, and they are years of turbulance on the part of the people and admonitions on the part of God, until finally He suffered them to be led away into captivity.

The scene of our next woman in White Raiment is in the reign of Ahasuerus, son of Xerxes, who lived B. C. 462. After several severe conflicts he was settled in peaceable possession of the Persian Empire, and, in honor of his victory, appointed a feast in the city of Shushan, which continued for one hundred and eighty days, after which he gave a great feast to all the princes and people who were in Shushan for seven days.

HADASSAH IN THE PERSIAN COURT.

Queen Vashti, at the same time, made a like feast, in her apartment for the women.

On the seventh day of the feast, Ahasuerus commanded the seven chamberlains to bring Queen Vashti before him, with the crown royal on her head, that he might show to the princes and people her beauty.

This she refused, for the act would be contrary to the usage of Persia, very indecent and unbecoming a lady, as well as the dignity of her station. Whereupon the king was incensed, and fearing the influence among the people of the realm in encouraging women to disobey their husbands, called a council of seven, to determine what should be done. The council advised putting away the queen, and she was removed from her high position as queen, and a collection of virgins was ordered throughout the realm for the selection of a successor.

There lived at this time in Shushan a Jew named Mordecai, a descendant of Babylonish captives and who was a porter at the royal palace. Mordecai, not having children, brought up Hadassah, his uncle’s daughter. Her life opened like a cactus flower on the thorny stem of the captivity, but nevertheless is an exquisite jewel with a royally superb setting, and gleams and sparkles in Hebrew history.

Her mother named her Hadassah, for the myrtle tree, which was not only beautiful, with its glossy, dark-green leaves and luxuriant clusters of white bloom, but was useful for perfumery and spice. It was the emblem of justice, and bearing it may have added strength to her character. Her Persian name was Esther, for the planet Venus. Orientals held the myrtle sacred to the goddess of Love.

Esther, being fair and beautiful, was made choice of among other maidens in this collection of virgins which had been ordered, and was carried to the king’s palace and there committed to the care of Hegai, and was assigned to the best apartments.

This captive young woman was discreet. Those who have great beauty do not always have discretion. Depending upon the power of their personal charms, they neglect to cultivate the mind and soul. Physical beauty, like fruit, begins to decline as soon as it reaches its best. Mental and spiritual beauty grow with the years as long as the hygienic laws of grace are obeyed. But she was not only discreet, but also amiable. Amiability costs only self-control and unselfish love, and it is the best possible investment. Genuine amiability is God’s gift to those who trust Him to cleanse them from all that is contrary to love.

Then also this Hebrew maiden must have known severe discipline. She showed its effect in the gentle deportment that won the favor of the officers that guarded the king’s harem. She submitted her taste in dress and ornament to the one who had the responsibility of preparing her for the royal presence, and in the docility with which she heeded the advice of Mordecai.

These graces of mind and heart commended her to the king’s favor and she was advanced to higher honor, and subsequently, when Queen Vashti was deposed, Esther was crowned in her stead. Thus she was raised at once to the highest place that the world could give a woman at that day—as the queen and favorite of the mightiest monarch of his time.

This event was celebrated by a great feast which the king made to all his princes, called Esther’s feast, and which was attended with high honor, and by the presentation of gifts, “according to the state of the king.”

About this time Haman, the chief minister or vizier of King Ahasuerus, was promoted, so that his seat was “above all the princes.” The Targum and Josephus interpret the description of Haman, the Agagite, as signifying that he was of Amalekitish descent, the sworn enemies of the Israelites in their march through the desert, and the sparing of whom cost Saul, the first king of Israel, his crown. This Haman was the king’s favorite, and all the under officers and servants were required to pay reverence unto him.

But there was one man who would not bow. This was Mordecai, the porter at the royal palace. He would not salute Haman, the idolatrous descendent of the old enemies of his people. This greatly displeased Haman, but he scorned to lay hands on Mordecai, and knowing him to be a Jew, resolved to destroy him and his people. He took council and determined by lot on the day for the accomplishment of his purpose.

To do this successfully he must deceive the king and entrap him to do a wicked act. So he said to Ahasuerus, “There is a certain people scattered abroad and dispersed among the people in all the provinces of thy kingdom; and their laws are diverse from all people; neither keep they the king’s laws; therefore it is not for the king’s profit to suffer them. If it please the king, let it be written that they be destroyed; and I will pay ten thousand talents of silver to the hands of those that have the charge of the business, to bring it into the king’s treasuries.” And so this hateful Amalekite, by offering to pay into the king’s treasury more than $10,000,000, obtained the royal decree to put all the Israelites in the hundred and twenty-seven provinces of Ahasuerus, extending from India to Ethiopia, to death.

When Mordecai heard of the decree, he and the Hebrews made great lamentation, and he made Queen Esther acquainted with the plot to destroy her people, and entreated her to go in unto the king and make supplication for their rescue. At first she excused herself, but being led to understand that she, too, was included in the decree, she put her life on the hazard for the safety of her countrymen. It was no light matter for the beautiful young queen to risk her life to save her people. Surrounded as she was by the luxury and elegance of that magnificent Persian court, keenly alive to the charm of all lovely things, it meant much for her to go down to the grave in the brilliant morning of her youth.

But when Mordecai turned to her for help, he reminded her that she had come to the kingdom for such a time as that. His faith asserted that God would deliver His people; and, if she failed to do her part, she and her father’s house would perish. She said she would make the attempt. “If I perish, I perish,” was her wail of submission.

However, in her great undertaking, she displayed a humble dependence upon the God of Israel; she also showed great prudence and wisdom. She asked her people to fast and pray three days; and all her maidens—who were selected, no doubt, on account of their sympathy with her faith—would also fast and pray. When the books are opened it may appear that the Hebrews were led, through the deliverance that she wrought for them, to the penitence that made it possible for God to take them back to the fatherland.

ESTHER PLEADING FOR HER PEOPLE.

At the end of the fast she put on her royal apparel and went unto the king while he was seated upon his throne. The first gleam of hope lighted up her distressed heart when Ahasuerus held out his golden sceptre.

It has been said that men’s hearts are reached through their stomachs. Whether this was true of Ahasuerus, or whether Esther knew of this avenue or not, she certainly showed great tact when she desired to make a banquet for the king and his favorite prince, Haman, which the beautiful queen would prepare, where he could then hear her request.

It would have been a most natural thing to do, after Esther had risked her life by going uncalled into the presence of the king, and when she found him graciously disposed to partake of her feast, to throw herself at once upon his mercy, and beg for her life and the lives of her people. But no. She must have great power over him to get him to undertake the difficult task of setting aside one of his own decrees. Probably her faith in God was not yet strong enough for her to make a sure move. She saw that she was not yet sure of her ground, nor firm in her faith; so, when he made the great offer even of dividing his kingdom with her, she simply asked that he and Haman should honor her with their presence at another banquet.

Doubtless, as she sat at the second banquet with the perfect self-control that they have who rely only on God, having used every device to fortify her position in the good graces of the capricious despot, her keen Hebrew insight weighed every light expression from his lips, although she knew a sword of doom hung over her jewel-crowned head, and yet she was calm and self-contained, as if she had no thought but to please him. Thus she led the king on until her power over him was at its height, and when he again offered her half the kingdom, she asked only for her life and the lives of her people.

It must be that, although Haman was present at this banquet, he did not hear the request of Queen Esther, for he went forth from the feast “that day joyful and with a glad heart.” But when he saw Mordecai, in the king’s gate, and that he still refused to bow to him, “he was full of indignation.”

So when he reached his own residence, he called his friends, and took counsel with them, and they advised him to cause a gallows to be built, eighty feet high, and to ask the next morning to have the king order Mordecai to be hanged thereon.

But matters had taken a different turn at the palace. The king could not sleep that night. To pass the long, wakeful hours, he called for the reading of the records of the kingdom. As they were reading before the king, it was found written in the chronicles of the conspiracy of Bigthan and Terish, and that Mordecai had discovered the plot, and that nothing had been done for him as a reward.

In the meantime the morning drew on, and Haman had entered the court of the palace to confer with the king about the hanging of Mordecai. We can well believe the mind of Ahasuerus was in a bad frame to talk about hanging the man who had saved his life by discovering the plot of the king’s chamberlains. But the king did not know what dark deeds were in the heart of Haman as he ordered him to be called. When Haman came into the presence of Ahasuerus, the king asked what should be done with the man whom he wanted to honor.

The king’s favorite, who had just shared two private banquets with the king, was so inflated with himself that he did not think there was another man in the Persian empire in whom Ahasuerus would be so delighted to honor as himself, so he advised that the royal apparel be brought forth and the king’s horse and his crown, and given to one of the noble princes to array the man whom the king delighted to honor, and take him through the city on horseback with a proclamation, “This is the man whom the king delighteth to honor.”

The command was given to Haman to thus honor Mordecai, which he did, with not very good grace, for, when he had finished his task, he “hasted to his house mourning, and having his head covered,” and related his mortification to his wife and friends.

After all, for the moment at least, it must have seemed to Haman and his friends as a strange act on the part of the king, for while they were yet talking over the humiliation, the king’s chamberlains came, requesting Haman to hasten and come to the banquet Esther had prepared. It must have seemed to Haman that Esther had really gone into the banqueting business, so frequently had he been honored of late.

When the king and Haman sat down to the banquet the king again asked Esther what was her petition. Whereupon she humbly prayed the king that her life might be given her and her people, for a design was laid for the destruction of her and her kindred. At which the king asked with much anger who it was that durst do this thing. She told him that Haman, then present, was the author of the wicked plot, and she laid the whole scheme open to the king. Who can tell how much her own chance of salvation depended on her courage, self-control and tact? A look, even the droop of an eye-lid, might have betrayed her into the hands of the most cringing and unscrupulous of royal favorites, and sent her and her whole race to their death. But God held her steady in nerve and growing in faith, as He does all who put their whole trust in Him.

The king rose up with much wrath from the banquet and walked out into the garden.

Haman saw his opportunity. Quickly he stood up to plead for his life. Perceiving that there was evil determined against him by the king, he prostrated himself before the queen upon the couch on which she was sitting to supplicate for his life; in which position the king found him on his return.

The motive for Haman’s unhappy attitude before the queen was misunderstood by the king, and he spoke in great passion, “What, will he force the queen before me in the house!”

At which words the servants present immediately covered Haman’s face, as was the usage to condemned persons, and the chamberlain, who had called Haman to the banquet, acquainted the king with the gallows he saw in his house there prepared for Mordecai, who had saved the king’s life.

The king ordered Haman should be forthwith hanged thereon, which was accordingly done. A feast was then consecrated in commemoration of the deliverance of the Jews, called the feast of Purim.

This story of Esther, which has in it the real romance of life, has also a consummate blending of works and faith. Preparing a banquet of every luxury that could please a dangerous tyrant, and at the same time fasting and praying in heart-humbling agony for Divine deliverance.