Purim Reveals Redemption from that which is Hidden in Our Souls

Purim, the only Jewish holiday which is commemorated in exile, begins next week Saturday night. Purim is that special holiday where we seek God in the hidden nature of ourselves. We get an opportunity to look deeper into this special holiday in which we see the hidden nature of God in our own secret masks. Purim is holy because it reveals the hidden nature of our inner selves. The ancient Rabbis often referred to Purim as being greater than Yom Kippur. In fact they refer to Yom Kippur as a day like Purim.
Purim is unique because it asks us to reveal our true nature and also find the hidden nature of God while looking through the mask of exile. The question that many of our early sages often asked about this special day is what makes Purim so unique and why do we make such a big deal about something that happened in Persia almost 2,500 years ago.
The great Talmud scholar Rav Soloveitchik taught, “Purim is a call for Divine compassion and intercession, a mood of petition arising out of great distress.” Similarly, “the prayerful mood of Yom Kippur emerges out of a sense of spiritual anxiety and the desperate need for reconciliation with God.” Both holidays at their core are about the Jewish people calling out to God in time of trouble – one national trouble and one personal – and asking God to redeem us. We can perhaps especially relate to Purim this year as we look back on the many hardships we have endured and pray that God will forgive us and grant us a better year. As the saying in Israel goes, ‘May the old year and its curses end and the New Year and its blessings begin.’
Purim and Yom Kippur carry other similarities as both holidays are about the casting of lots. In the Purim story Haman casts lots to decide the day he will destroy the Jewish people. On Yom Kippur the high priest cast lots to determine which goat would be sacrificed to God and which goat would carry the sins of the children of Israel off into the wilderness where it would die. The lots themselves are a reminder of the randomness of life, that there are factors which are beyond our control and that we are ultimately dependent upon God. Purim, through its hidden nature, asks us to have greater faith in God and thus the reward is our national salvation.
The hero and heroine of the story are Mordechai and Esther. Their names betray their relationship with their host culture. Mordechai’s name contains the name of the Persian god Marduk. In Mesopotamian religion Marduk was the chief god of the city of Babylon and the national god of Babylonia. And Esther, even according to the Talmud (Megilla 13a), was so called after Ishtar, the goddess of war and sexual love in Mesopotamian religion. As goddess of Venus, Ishtar was also the protector of wayward women. Either way Esther becomes the central focus of the story.
Esther’s exceptional ability to avoid being identified as a Jew is held up in the Talmud (Megilla 13a) as one of her characteristic features. R. Eleazar comments, “every man took her for a member of his own people.” Purim then, is the quintessential tale of assimilated Jewry and thus it is often called the day we celebrate the holiness of masks.
A core concept of Purim is the mask that we often put on ourselves to hide who we truly are from others and also from God. On Purim we are told to let God see who we truly are inside by donning actual masks that hide our face. We become much like the heroine, Esther, who revealed herself to the king of Persia to bring her people back to their roots and back to God. On Purim, we recognize God in our lives and find our true inner faith.
God is never mentioned in the book of Esther but it’s the people’s commitment to God that saves them and eventually allows their victory over the evil Haman. Thus we find our faith through the mask that Esther was forced to wear so we wear the masks on this day in honor of her wisdom and sacrifice that brought her people back to God. Through the act of hiding ourselves behind physical masks we end up revealing our true nature and thus we can find a deeper connection to God.
Purim is that special day where we hide ourselves to reveal our true identity and we hope through revealing what is hidden in ourselves God will reach out to us and reveal God’s true nature of compassion and love. Purim is special and thus, let’s make this holiday special in all our lives by embracing joy and love and compassion, the traits we hope God will show us as we often show our imperfections in life and hope for forgiveness from others.
Rabbi Jeffrey Lipschultz is the Rabbi of Beth Judah Temple in Wildwood N.J. He can be reached at dvjewish@rof.net