Strange Story: ESTHER 1 – THE HISTORICAL CONTEXT OF THE BOOK OF ESTHER

Darius I, also called Darius the Great, was the king who brought Persia to its highest level of power. King Darius invaded Greek but was repelled in a humiliating military defeat at Marathon in 490 BC. Darius did not die in that battle but died later (some think from illness), while preparing for a second invasion of Greece.

Xerxes, also called Ahasuerus, was the son of Darius I, and succeeded him as king in 486 BC.

The vast wealth that King Xerxes was putting on display for 180 days was not his own, it was inherited from his father. In an attempt to show that he too would be a great king, he planned and started several massive building projects, some of which appear to have been completed, and some were not.

During the 6^th year of his reign, 480 BC, King Xerxes went to finish what his father, Darius I had stared. At first the Athenians and the Spartans were fighting separately, and Xerxes experienced several major victories, defeating the Spartans and sacking Athens. However, the Greeks then formed an alliance, and Xerxes was blocked and stymied by the coalition of forces from Athens and Sparta. So he left his general, Mardonius, his navy and at least the elite regimens of his army there for the winter and returned home. The next spring, when fighting resumed under Mardonius (Xerxes stayed in Persia), the Persian army suffered another strategic loss and the Persian navy was destroyed, leaving them with no supply chain. General Mardonius was killed in battle and the Persian army returned home in defeat in the 7^th year of King Xerxes reign, arriving a few months before Esther was named Queen.