Esther 1:10-12 - Homilies By P.c. Barker

A noble womanly refusal.

We know from actual history literally nothing of Vashti, except her name, and what is written of her in the present connection. But it is evident that she could not have been merely one of the inferior wives of the Eastern king, although this has been suggested. She is not only emphatically called queen, but she acts as the queen, "making a feast for the women," while Ahasuerus makes his for the princes and the general people; and the choice and the bearing of her successor, Esther, point the same way. The name of Vashti appears to view a moment; it then utterly disappears—and in disgrace. Yet not in shame; neither in the shame of sin or folly, nor in the shame even of error of judgment and want of true wisdom. No; for "posterity approve her saying" and her doing. Our gaze was at first invited to her as one "very fair to look upon," a meteor of beauty. So her descending track, swift as it was, is one of real splendour; amid thick darkness around it marks a welcome line of light, and leaves a glory on our vision! This is all the more remarkable to be said of a heathen woman. Notice here a noble womanly refusal, and the womanly ground of it noble. We have here the spectacle of a woman who risked, who no doubt knew that she forfeited, a high position and all splendour of earthly prospects from that time forward, because she would not prejudice the due of her own womanly nature; because she would not be party to robbing herself of her feminine birthright; because she would not be minished in aught of her modesty's ultimate and indefeasible rights. When her affronted but determined voice and verdict were heard, as she "refused to come," this was heard in them—to wit, the clear ring of true womanly instinct and of intelligent womanly feeling.

I. THIS WAS A NOBLE REFUSAL BECAUSE OF WHAT IT COST . That "cost" may be reckoned in several ways. For instance, there was present

II. THIS WAS a NOBLE REFUSAL BECAUSE OF THE GROUND OF IT . It can perhaps scarcely be said that there were grounds for it. There were a multitude of (what very many would have considered) reasons why Vashti should not have refused to come, and there might truly have been reasons more than one, had she been differently situated, why she should have done as she actually did. Had she lived, for instance, at a different time of day, had she lived in a different country, had she belonged to a different race, there might have been some variety of reasons why she should have taken up the position she did, and adhered to it. But in point of fact there was probably great singleness of reason for this her great boldness of utterance and of action. Under certain circumstances one would have been glad to suppose that other considerations also played their part, and had their influence in Vashti's peremptory negative decision. But we should be artificial, ungenuine, and guilty of an anachronism if we supposed these now. And that we cannot bring these lesser lights to throw their fainter rays on the scene leaves it in the undivided glory of God's light. Here was his purity shedding its unflickering light on the thick darkness of that showy, sensual feast. The less we can justly set Vashti's refusal down to the higher conscious reflex acts of our nature, and moral effects resulting from them, the more is it attributable to the calm light of that lamp which God has hung in the retired and sacred cabinet of the bosom of woman, to decorate it, and to bless with its religious glimmering through the windows all that come near enough, but not too near! It is the lamp of sweet purity, of nature's own modesty, burning ever still with shame! That it is nature ' s modesty means that God's own hand hung it, lighted it. That it was burning in so unlikely a place, in such unfavourable conditions, at such a time, is all comfort and joy to our faith, for it means that God's hand had been round it, and shielded it so that it was not puffed out by the untoward gusts around. And that "frail woman"—borne upon now by every present-time influence, literally thronged with inducements to sink all shame for an hour that she might reign still for years, besieged with earthly motives to succumb and yield obedience to a coarse command—did refuse to succumb, ran the gauntlet of all consequences whatsoever, and, with an aroused indignation that would sleep no more, flung back the brutal mandate in the face of him who sent it, is fitted to show us how "in weakness" certain "strength is made perfect , " and how the things amazing and "impossible with man, are possible with God;" yes, even facile to his Spirit's breath.—B.