Esther 1:10-12

Queen Vashti is Removed from Her Royal Position

1:10 On the seventh day, as King Ahasuerus was feeling the effects of the wine, ¹  he ordered Mehuman, Biztha, Harbona, Bigtha, Abagtha, Zethar, and Carcas, the seven eunuchs who attended him, ²  1:11 to bring Queen Vashti into the king’s presence wearing her royal high turban. He wanted to show the people and the officials her beauty, for she was very attractive. ³  1:12 But Queen Vashti refused ⁴  to come at the king’s bidding ⁵  conveyed through the eunuchs. Then the king became extremely angry, and his rage consumed ⁶  him.

Isaiah 3:16-26

Washing Away Impurity

3:16 The Lord says,

“The women ⁷  of Zion are proud.

They walk with their heads high ⁸ 

and flirt with their eyes.

They skip along ⁹ 

and the jewelry on their ankles jingles. ¹⁰ 

3:17 So ¹¹  the sovereign master ¹²  will afflict the foreheads of Zion’s women ¹³  with skin diseases, ¹⁴ 

the Lord will make the front of their heads bald.” ¹⁵ 

3:18 ¹⁶ At that time ¹⁷  the sovereign master will remove their beautiful ankle jewelry, ¹⁸  neck ornaments, crescent shaped ornaments, 3:19 earrings, bracelets, veils, 3:20 headdresses, ankle ornaments, sashes, sachets, ¹⁹  amulets, 3:21 rings, nose rings, 3:22 festive dresses, robes, shawls, purses, 3:23 garments, vests, head coverings, and gowns. ²⁰ 

3:24 A putrid stench will replace the smell of spices, ²¹ 

a rope will replace a belt,

baldness will replace braided locks of hair,

a sackcloth garment will replace a fine robe,

and a prisoner’s brand will replace beauty.

3:25 Your ²²  men will fall by the sword,

your strong men will die in battle. ²³ 

3:26 Her gates will mourn and lament;

deprived of her people, she will sit on the ground. ²⁴ 

Daniel 5:2

5:2 While under the influence ²⁵  of the wine, Belshazzar issued an order to bring in the gold and silver vessels – the ones that Nebuchadnezzar his father ²⁶  had confiscated ²⁷  from the temple in Jerusalem ²⁸  – so that the king and his nobles, together with his wives and his concubines, could drink from them. ²⁹ 

Matthew 14:6

14:6 But on Herod’s birthday, the daughter of Herodias danced before them and pleased Herod,

[1:10]  ¹ tn Heb “as the heart of the king was good with the wine.” Here the proper name (King Ahasuerus) has been substituted for the title in the translation for stylistic reasons.

[1:10]  ² tn Heb “King Ahasuerus”; here the proper name has been replaced by the pronoun “him” in the translation for stylistic reasons. Cf. similarly NIV, NCV, CEV, NLT “King Xerxes.”

[1:11]  ³ tn Heb “was good of appearance”; KJV “was fair to look on”; NAB “was lovely to behold.”

[1:12]  ⁴ sn Refusal to obey the king was risky even for a queen in the ancient world. It is not clear why Vashti behaved so rashly and put herself in such danger. Apparently she anticipated humiliation of some kind and was unwilling to subject herself to it, in spite of the obvious dangers. There is no justification in the biblical text for an ancient Jewish targumic tradition that the king told her to appear before his guests dressed in nothing but her royal high turban, that is, essentially naked.

[1:12]  ⁵ tn Heb “at the word of the king”; NASB “at the king’s command.”

[1:12]  ⁶ tn Heb “burned in him” (so KJV).

[3:16]  ⁷ tn Heb “daughters” (so KJV, NAB, NRSV).

[3:16]  ⁸ tn Heb “with an outstretched neck.” They proudly hold their heads high so that others can see the jewelry around their necks.

[3:16]  ⁹ tn Heb “walking and skipping, they walk.”

[3:16]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “and with their feet they jingle.”

[3:17]  ¹¹ tn In the Hebrew text vv. 16-17 and one long sentence, “Because the daughters of Zion are proud and walk…, the sovereign master will afflict….” In v. 17 the Lord refers to himself in the third person.

[3:17]  ¹² tn The Hebrew term translated “sovereign master” here and in v. 18 is אֲדֹנָי (’adonay).

[3:17]  ¹³ tn Heb “the daughters of Zion.”

[3:17]  ¹⁴ tn Or “a scab” (KJV, ASV); NIV, NCV, CEV “sores.”

[3:17]  ¹⁵ tn The precise meaning of this line is unclear because of the presence of the rare word פֹּת (pot). Since the verb in the line means “lay bare, make naked,” some take פֹּת as a reference to the genitals (cf. KJV, ASV, NRSV, CEV). (In 1 Kgs 7:50 a noun פֹּת appears, with the apparent meaning “socket.”) J. N. Oswalt (Isaiah [NICOT], 1:139, n. 2), basing his argument on alleged Akkadian evidence and the parallelism of the verse, takes פֹּת as “forehead.”

[3:18]  ¹⁶ sn The translation assumes that the direct quotation ends with v. 17. The introductory formula “in that day” and the shift from a poetic to prosaic style indicate that a new speech unit begins in v. 18.

[3:18]  ¹⁷ tn Or “in that day” (KJV).

[3:18]  ¹⁸ tn Or “the beauty of [their] ankle jewelry.”

[3:20]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “houses of breath.” HALOT 124 s.v. בַּיִת defines them as “scent-bottles”; cf. NAB, NRSV “perfume boxes.”

[3:23]  ²⁰ tn The precise meaning of many of the words in this list is uncertain.

[3:24]  ²¹ tn Heb “and it will be in place of spices there will be a stench.” The nouns for “spices” and “stench” are right next to each other in the MT for emphatic contrast. The verb that introduces this verse serves as a discourse particle and is untranslated; see note on “in the future” in 2:2.

[3:25]  ²² tn The pronoun is feminine singular, suggesting personified Zion, as representative of its women, is the addressee. The reference to “her gates’ in v. 26 makes this identification almost certain.

[3:25]  ²³ tn Heb “your strength in battle.” The verb in the first clause provides the verbal idea for the second clause.

[3:26]  ²⁴ tn Heb “she will be empty, on the ground she will sit.” Jerusalem is personified as a destitute woman who sits mourning the empty city.

[5:2]  ²⁵ tn Or perhaps, “when he had tasted” (cf. NASB) in the sense of officially initiating the commencement of the banquet. The translation above seems preferable, however, given the clear evidence of inebriation in the context (cf. also CEV “he got drunk and ordered”).

[5:2]  ²⁶ tn Or “ancestor”; or “predecessor” (also in vv. 11, 13, 18). The Aramaic word translated “father” can on occasion denote these other relationships.

[5:2]  ²⁷ tn Or “taken.”

[5:2]  ²⁸ map For location see Map5 B1; Map6 F3; Map7 E2; Map8 F2; Map10 B3; JP1 F4; JP2 F4; JP3 F4; JP4 F4.

[5:2]  ²⁹ sn Making use of sacred temple vessels for an occasion of reveling and drunkenness such as this would have been a religious affront of shocking proportions to the Jewish captives.