At this point, in the Book of Esther the record resumes five years after Esther had been made queen (Esther 2:16-17; cp. 3:7). The king had made Haman a kind of prime minister of his kingdom (Esther 3:1), but his power was limited to the king’s servants in his government. Haman had no authority over the royal family (cp. Esther 1:14). The Jews in Jerusalem had gained great success in their efforts to build the wall around the city of Jerusalem and in rebuilding their Temple, for they built by the inspiration of the prophets (Ezra 5:1-2) and through the permission of the king (Ezra 6:1-3, 7-12, 15). Nevertheless, the Jews’ many enemies had conspired to mingle with the Jews through marriage, thus, destroying the purity of their race and their religion, vis-à-vis their covenant with God (Ezra 9:1-2; Nehemiah 13:23-24; cp. Deuteronomy 7:1-4, 6; 14:2). Nevertheless, the king declared a release for all those in his kingdom in celebration of his marriage to Esther, queen of Persia (Esther 2:16-18).
It was then that Ezra, a ready scribe in the Law of Moses, gained the favor of the king and was sent to Jerusalem (Ezra 7:1, 6-8), by the decree of the king to bring everyone there to obey the Law of the God of Israel or suffer the consequences (Ezra 7:10, 25-26). In other words, the Law of Moses would become the constitutional law of the Jews! It was through the leadership of Ezra that the conspiracy to destroy the religion of the Jews failed. Such a thing would, also, have prevented the Lord’s participation in his creation. Ezra’s success came by preaching the Law of Moses and excommunicating or banishing all those who did not repent of their sin and put away their heathen wives and children (Nehemiah 1-3, 8-9; 9:1-3). Thus, the conspiracy of the heathen to keep the Jews from building the House of God, and later to destroy their religion my marrying into the Jewish nation, thereby destroying the work of God, came to an abrupt end. Their failure came because of Esther’s marriage to the king of Persia, which through its celebration gained the release of Ezra, the ready scribe in the Law of Moses. It was the Lord God of Israel who worked in it all to bring his will to pass (Ezra 7:27-28).
Now we come to Haman’s promotion above all the other servants of the king (Esther 3:1). The king commanded all his other servants to bow before and revere him (Esther 3:2). However, Mordecai refused to do so. When the king’s servants, who served at the king’s gate, saw it, they challenged Mordecai, reminding him he was breaking the king’s commandment, but Mordecai claimed his religious convictions, as a Jew, demanded his civil disobedience (Esther 3:3-4), which, if true, was permitted. Nevertheless, the Law of God doesn’t preclude obedience to anyone in authority, or to reverence the same (2Peter 2:13-15; cp. Genesis 27:29; 41:43). To bow or curtsey before someone in authority is indicative of deference and respect. Such things were done before anyone, whom a person respected (Exodus 18:7; 1Kings 1:16). So, Mordecai was breaking the law, and slandering God by implying the Lord commanded it, because Mordecai was a Jew (Esther 3:4).
Therefore, the king’s servants informed Haman of what occurred, in order to see if such a thing would stand up to the law of the land. When Haman saw that Mordecai did, indeed, refuse to honor him, his wrath burned against him (Esther 3:5). At first Haman intended to have Mordecai slain, but, when he learned that Mordecai had confessed he was a Jew, Haman’s thirst for blood filled his heart, seeing an opportunity to utterly destroy his family’s ancient enemy, Israel. Therefore, he conspired to slay the whole nation, whom Mordecai had thought to represent by refusing to obey the king’s command (Esther 3:6).
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