{"id":57468,"date":"2019-06-14T16:34:49","date_gmt":"2019-06-14T13:34:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/?p=57468"},"modified":"2023-01-08T14:02:52","modified_gmt":"2023-01-08T12:02:52","slug":"saul-and-purim","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/saul-and-purim\/","title":{"rendered":"Saul And Purim"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[281],"tags":[888,887,515,885],"acf":{"old_id":"57468","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":57331,"related_cahpter":"241","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content":{"description":"What this son of Kish doesn\u2019t accomplish here, another one will 500 years hence","content":"

When studying Tanach, it is important to pay attention to language, word choice, and sentence structure. Different books of Tanach will mimic the language from other books of Tanach in order to teach us a lesson or convey a theme. At the very beginning of our chapter, Saul is introduced in a way that is mimicked by the introduction of another famous leader of the Jewish people over 500 years later in Persia. <\/span><\/p>\n

Saul is introduced first through the lineage of his father Kish as follows “There was a man from the tribe Benjamin and his name was Kish the son of Aviel the son of Tzror the son of Bechorot the son of Afiach the son of a Benjamite.” \u00a0(Samuel I 9:1)<\/span><\/p>\n

Saul himself is introduced based on his good looks as “an excellent young man; no one among the Israelites was handsomer than he; he was a head taller than any of the people” (Samuel I 9:2).<\/span><\/p>\n

This structure and word choice appears almost identically in the Book of Esther. <\/span><\/p>\n

In the Book of Esther, Mordecai is introduced in the same way as Kish – “There was a Jewish man in Shushan and his name was Mordechai the son Yair, the son of Kish (a different Kish), a man from the tribe of Benjamin” (Esther 2:5)<\/span><\/p>\n

Esther is then introduced in the same manner that Saul himself is introduced- by a description of her good looks “and the maiden was beautiful and good looking” (Esther 2:7).<\/span><\/p>\n

The Book of Esther is written with the Book of Samuel in mind. The Book of Esther wants to invoke the handsome first king of Israel for a reason. Why connect the three figures and the two books?<\/span><\/p>\n

(Spoiler alert!) The rule of Saul is ultimately defined by Saul’s inability to properly defeat Amalek, by taking Agag -the King of Amalek- hostage instead of immediately killing him. This angers God who decrees that as a result of this miscalculation Saul will be deposed. The Purim story is about the defeat of the descendant of Agag, Haman. (According to Gemara Megillah 13a, Agag was able to procreate during the extra day he was left alive by Saul, and Haman emerged from that line).<\/span><\/p>\n

By connecting the story of Purim to Saul, the Book of Esther is trying to show that the heirs of Saul both in lineage and in good looks are finally able to right the wrong of Saul and defeat Amalek in the form of Haman. <\/span><\/p>\n","image":{"ID":57469,"id":57469,"title":"isam9-drama","filename":"isam9-drama.png","filesize":0,"url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/isam9-drama.png","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/saul-and-purim\/isam9-drama\/","alt":"","author":"7","description":"","caption":"","name":"isam9-drama","status":"inherit","uploaded_to":57468,"date":"2019-06-14 13:34:33","modified":"2019-06-14 13:34:44","menu_order":0,"mime_type":"image\/png","type":"image","subtype":"png","icon":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-includes\/images\/media\/default.png","width":1280,"height":1156,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/isam9-drama-150x150.png","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/isam9-drama-300x271.png","medium-width":300,"medium-height":271,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/isam9-drama-768x694.png","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":694,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/isam9-drama-1024x925.png","large-width":1024,"large-height":925,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/isam9-drama.png","1536x1536-width":1280,"1536x1536-height":1156,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/isam9-drama.png","2048x2048-width":1280,"2048x2048-height":1156,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/isam9-drama-1200x1084.png","post_full_size-width":1200,"post_full_size-height":1084,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/isam9-drama-465x420.png","home_baner-width":465,"home_baner-height":420}},"embedded_video":"","video_duration":"","show_fb_comments":true,"credit_media":""},"tile":{"top_caption":"","main_caption":"Saul And Purim","main_caption_size":"1","sub_caption":"What this son of Kish doesn\u2019t accomplish here, another one will 500 years hence","preview_embedded":"","preview_image":{"ID":57469,"id":57469,"title":"isam9-drama","filename":"isam9-drama.png","filesize":0,"url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/isam9-drama.png","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/saul-and-purim\/isam9-drama\/","alt":"","author":"7","description":"","caption":"","name":"isam9-drama","status":"inherit","uploaded_to":57468,"date":"2019-06-14 13:34:33","modified":"2019-06-14 13:34:44","menu_order":0,"mime_type":"image\/png","type":"image","subtype":"png","icon":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-includes\/images\/media\/default.png","width":1280,"height":1156,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/isam9-drama-150x150.png","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/isam9-drama-300x271.png","medium-width":300,"medium-height":271,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/isam9-drama-768x694.png","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":694,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/isam9-drama-1024x925.png","large-width":1024,"large-height":925,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/isam9-drama.png","1536x1536-width":1280,"1536x1536-height":1156,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/isam9-drama.png","2048x2048-width":1280,"2048x2048-height":1156,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/isam9-drama-1200x1084.png","post_full_size-width":1200,"post_full_size-height":1084,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/isam9-drama-465x420.png","home_baner-width":465,"home_baner-height":420}},"preview_video":"","external_link":"","link_for_pay":false,"tile_gallery_items":false,"credits":""},"alternate_tile":{"top_caption":"","main_caption":"","main_caption_size":"1","sub_caption":"","hide_media":false},"tile_group":{"preview_image_url":false,"main_caption":"","sub_caption":"","":null,"popup_package_extra_content":"","read_time":""},"home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo":{"seo_title":"","seo_description":"","seo_default_title":"","seo_default_description":""},"links":false,"send_noty":false},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57468"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=57468"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57468\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":111268,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57468\/revisions\/111268"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=57468"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=57468"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=57468"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}