Procrastinate Tomorrow - Purim 5784

 Purim begins this Saturday night, marking the great miracle when the attempted genocide of the Jews was transformed into a successful war of self-defense.  The Megillah story is well known, and if you study the Talmud and Midrash it becomes truly fascinating.  

Let me ask you a question:  How is it possible that Haman didn’t suspect something fishy going on when Esther twice invited him to dine with her and her husband the King?  Esther had just approached the king, at great risk to her life, to ask him “for something,” which she would share with him at a banquet with him and Haman.

At the feast, with Esther looking pale and weak from three days of fasting, the king asks her, in front of Haman, what he can give her, even offering her half his kingdom..  Rather than telling him why she went to all this trouble, she instead invites both mento another intimate meal tomorrow!  What was Haman thinking?  Where was his antenna?  Didn't he suspect a trap? 

Now you could say that Haman was such a narcissist that he couldn’t imagine that Esther had anything but loving intentions for him, but a man as paranoid as Haman must have had some inkling that maybe there was something strange about this.

The fact is that Esther invited Haman precisely to set a trap for him.  The Midrash gives a few reasons for this seemingly strange act of having another man join her and her husband when she needed to convince him to change his mind.  One reason was because she knew that Achashverosh was fickle and changed his mind very quickly, as he had demonstrated with his previous wife, Vashti (whom he had beheaded in a fit of rage and soon thereafter regretted).  So she wanted Haman right there when the king got angry at him, so that he would be eliminated before the king changed his mind.  

Another reason given is that she wanted to arouse the king’s jealousy, intimating that there was a connection between Esther and Haman.  And in fact, the Megillah tells us, when Achashverosh left the room in rage after Esther told him that Haman wanted to kill her, Haman fell onto Esther’s couch (pushed by an angel).  When the king came back into the room and saw this, his suspicions were justified and he immediately ordered Haman to be killed.

So how did Haman, a cunning man of intrigue who had climbed the ladder to become second in command, not suspect that Esther had ill intentions toward him?

I would like to share an interesting commentary that I read this week, quoted by Rabbi Shneor Ashkenazi.  When the king asked Esther, at the first feast, what she wanted, she said “tomorrow I’ll tell you.”  This made Haman think that she was like him.  To understand this idea, we need to understand the mystical teachings about Amalek.  

Why is it so important for us to remember Amalek as part of the daily prayers?  Besides that they are always lurking and waiting for an opportunity to destroy us, and we must never let our guard down, there is a mystical explanation too. 

Amalek, the Torah tells us, tries to “cool us down” from the excitement of Torah. The first time we encountered Amalek, it was when the Jews were elated after the Exodus and all the miracles surrounding it, and excitedly heading toward Mount Sinai to receive the Torah.  Along came Amalek and said “you’re not so hot.”   They ignored the fact that Hashem was obviously protecting the Jews and, like a fool who jumps into a steaming bathtub, they went to war with G-d’s people.  Spiritually  they were saying: why are you so excited about rushing to receive the Torah?  Slow down, take it easy.  

In life our internal personal Amalek is what happens when we get spiritually awakened and excited to do a Mitzvah.  Amalek says, don’t be so excited!  This can wait till tomorrow.  Procrastination kills our enthusiasm, and often leads to the excitement and growth dying down.  The central Hebrew letters of Amalek, mem and lamed, are related to the word “melika,’ which is a procedure for beheading bird sacrifices in the Temple..  Amalek tries to stop us in our tracks, cutting off our minds from emotions and actions.

So when Haman heard Esther say “tomorrow,” he thought he was with a person who shared his philosophy.  The Torah’s way is that when we get inspired, when we feel close to Hashem, we immediately act on it.  This attitude was expressed when the Jews left Egypt.  They “didn’t have time” to bake bread so they baked Matzah instead.  Why the rush?  They were now free and leaving “with an upraised hand,” having vanquished Pharaoh and his people.  They couldn’t have waited a couple more hours for the bread to rise?  Chassidus explains that as soon as they had the opportunity to get away from the evil of Egypt and head toward Sinai, they didn’t wait for a moment, and rushed out immediately.

I wish you a wonderful, joyous Purim.  May we celebrate this together with all of the hostages freed, with all our troops safe, with true peace in the land and around the world and with no threat from modern day Hamans and their henchmen.  I encourage you to personally fight Amalek by translating the excitement of the day into action - namely the four special Mitzvot of Purim: Hearing the Megillah read from a scroll on Saturday night and Sunday, giving gifts of food to friends, giving money to at least two poor people (or to a fund that distributes it for you, like here), and having a festive meal on Sunday including bread, meat (if you are a meat eater) and wine.

Happy Purim!