SHABBAT ZACHOR
FROM TALMUD AND MIDRASH
Esther Rabbah Proem 7
Prophecy of Samuel
Rabbi Levi began his discourse on the Megillah of Esther
by considering this verse:
“If you do not dispossess the current inhabitants
of the Land from before you,
then those whom you leave
will become barbs in your eyes
and thorns in your sides,
and they will vex you upon the Land
in which you dwell.”
(Numbers 33:55)
It applies to King Saul, after the Prophet Samuel had charged him, “Now go and attack Amalek, destroy completely all that they have, show no mercy, slay both man and woman, child and infant, ox and sheep, camel and ass” (I Samuel 15:3)! But upon his return: You went out innocent, but you brought back a sinner whom you treated with mercy—as was said, “Saul and the people spared Agag king of Amalek and the best of the animals, destroying only the least desirable” (ibid. 9). Now a growth will spring forth from him to “become barbs in your eyes and thorns in your sides” (Numbers 33:55a), and who is that? It is “Haman son of Hamdatha the Agagite,” who intended “to destroy, to kill and to annihilate all of the Jews, both young and old, both women and children” (Esther 3:13 et al.)!
With this realization in mind, the first word of Megillat Esther, Vahyehee, “Now it was…,” can be heard as Vahye-hee, “Woe that it was”: Woe that the Prophecy of Samuel came to pass in the days of Ahashuerus!
Sedra Summary 