Helena Zlotnick, «From Jezebel to Esther: Fashioning Images of Queenship in the Hebrew Bible», Vol. 82 (2001) 477-495
Only three royal couples in the HB are seen in direct communication. Of these, two, namely Ahab and Jezebel, Ahasuerus and Esther, contribute unique insights into the interpretative and redactional processes that cast later narratives around themes of earlier stories, and both around the figure of a queen. In this article I explore the hypothesis that the scroll of Esther was shaped as a reversible version of the Jezebel cycle. With the aid of narratives of the early Roman monarchy, a sensitive and sensible reading of the biblical texts relating to Jezebel and Esther demonstrates the constructive process of an ideology of queenship. Underlying both constructs is a condemnation of monarchy in general.
provides a precedent for the public stoning of a man who blasphemes God. However, the Pentateuchal tale focuses on a blasphemer who is half Israelite, half Egyptian, leaving open the question of the fate of a fully-fledged Israelite. There are no rules relating to procedure in the case of blaspheming a king24. Nor is it clear if the charge against Naboth involved a public or private manifestation of disrespect. The two knaves testify that he had done so presumably within earshot.
What the redactional recording of the Jezreel proceedings leaves in no doubt is its ‘reading’ of the entire affair as a blasphemy. In this interpretative fashion the tale is launched with Naboth’s (futile) appeal to YHWH. It continues with Ahab’s (fruitful) entrusting the queen with a resolution, and ends with a fatal accusation of blasphemy. In the process, Jezebel, already cast as the persecutor of YHWH’s prophets, is characterized as a prosecutor of YHWH’s innocent worshipper25.
The transformation of a private grievance (between Naboth and Ahab), through Jezebel, into a public charge becomes the dominant motif behind the scroll’s recreation of the events that led to a ‘judgement’ (without trial) of the Jews of Persia. Originating as an encounter between two individuals, Haman and Mordechai, a private feud is turned into a public affair when Haman approaches Ahasuerus with accusations regarding the Jewish community of the Persian empire. Like Jezebel, Haman cannot broach the real object of his impeachment speech and, like her once more, he concocts a general charge that depicts the Jews as a subversive element in the kingdom. Presenting them as people who ‘do not abide by the royal laws’ (Esth 3,8) Haman, like Jezebel, initiates a legitimate action against an appointed victim. And once more like the queen who promises the delivery of Naboth’s vineyard into Ahab’s hands, Haman assures the king of substantial material rewards as a result of the anti-Jewish law.