There was in Shushan the fortress a certain Jew, whose name was Mordecai, the son of Jair, the son of Shimei, the son of Kish, a Benjaminite,
The book of Esther opens in the Persian palace, and here we meet an unknown exile — a Jew named Mordecai, from a family carried off from Jerusalem. That short family record raises the questions the whole book turns on: why is he still far from home, and who placed him in the capital?
The name of God never appears in Esther. One writer reads that silence as the key to the whole story.
William KellyHere we have the grand development of secret providence, when God's name cannot be named. God can work where He cannot proclaim Himself.
The next verse traces this family back to the deportation under Jeconiah, king of Judah. Some readers assume Mordecai himself made that journey. The numbers then make no sense, as one commentator explains.
Arno Clemens GaebeleinThey claim that Mordecai belonged to the captives carried away by Nebuchadnezzar. Then they say that, if that were so, Mordecai must have been over 130 years old and Esther at least 70. But does it say that Mordecai was carried away in the time of King Jeconiah? It was not Mordecai who was carried away but his great-grandfather Kish.
So Mordecai was born into exile. He had never seen the city his family came from.
Leslie M. GrantMordecai's grandfather had been carried captive by the Babylonians. Since that was over 70 years earlier, Mordecai was no doubt born in Persia. So were the great majority of Jews who lived during that captivity.
The name Kish points back to Israel's first royal family.
H. L. RossierThis Kish was no doubt of Saul's family, as his name shows... The name of Kish was famous for its link with the kingship God once set up in Israel. He rejected that kingship because it was unfaithful. We may well think that Mordecai's great-grandfather belonged to this dethroned royal family. When Cyrus gave his decree, Zerubbabel, the last of David's family, returned to Jerusalem with the faithful part of Judah. A representative of Saul's family stayed with the ruined, rejected people.
That old family line has unfinished business. Saul, the son of Kish, was Israel's first king.
Arend RemmersSaul, the son of Kish, spared Agag, King of the Amalekites, and was rejected by God for his disobedience (1 Sam. 15). Mordecai, who was also a son of Kish (Esther 2:5), arranged the execution of Haman, the Agagite (Esther 3:1). By this he carried out the judgment of God and gained great honour.
Cyrus had allowed the Jews to go home. Mordecai stayed, and commentators differ over how to read that. Some see a real failure, measured against other captives:
Morrish Bible DictionaryHow different Mordecai is from Ezra or Nehemiah! They were captives like him. But they were not content to spend their lives at the gate of a pagan king's palace when they had the chance to return to Jerusalem.
Others read his staying as duty rather than indifference:
H. L. RossierHe had not used the decree of Cyrus to return to Jerusalem. This was not out of indifference. Like Daniel and Nehemiah, he had a duty to carry out at the king's court. He could not leave without special permission, and his position probably forbade him to ask for it.
Whatever we make of his choice, the people in danger later in the book are the exiles who stayed.
J. N. DarbyThe people in danger were from the captivity of Judah (Esther 2:5-6). They were among those who had not returned to the land of Canaan. If this shows a lack of faith and energy on their part, and little love for the house and city of God, then it proves all the more the absolute and sovereign goodness and faithfulness of that God Himself.
Older translations introduce him as "a certain Jew"; the ESV has simply "a Jew." That plain phrase becomes the hinge of everything that follows.
C. H. MackintoshOf all the officers, ministers and attendants around the palace, only one was to discover the plot against the king's life: "a certain Jew whose name was Mordecai." ... In the royal records there was an entry about "a certain Jew," and it had to come at once before the eyes of the restless king. Mordecai must come into notice.
- Hidden. God's name is absent from Esther, but His hand is not: He works where He cannot announce Himself.
- Descended. Mordecai was not the exile himself. His great-grandfather Kish was carried away, and Mordecai was born in Persia.
- Marked. He comes from the line of Kish, the family of Israel's first king. Saul spared Agag; Mordecai brings Agag's descendant to justice.
- Disputed. Commentators differ on why he never returned to Jerusalem. Some see slackness beside Ezra and Nehemiah. Others see a post at court he was not free to leave.
- Positioned. The exiles who stayed were the ones later in danger. Their rescue rested on the sovereign goodness of God, who worked through one "certain Jew" in the palace.
who had been carried away from Jerusalem with the captives who had been carried away with Jeconiah king of Judah, whom Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon had carried away.
One sentence of family history reaches back more than a century. It ties the man at the Persian palace gate to the day Babylon took Jerusalem's king away. Who exactly did Nebuchadnezzar carry off? And why date a Jew in Susa by a deportation so long before?
Jeconiah is the king also called Jehoiachin. His removal was one stage in a longer collapse. One reference work sets the deportations side by side:
Morrish Bible DictionaryThe captivity of Judah followed in four stages. In 606 BC, Nebuchadnezzar carried away the sacred vessels and captives, including Daniel and his companions. This began the "times of the Gentiles." The second captivity came in 599 BC, after Jehoiachin had reigned three months. This one is called the great captivity.
The same work lists the king's names across the Bible:
Morrish Bible DictionaryScripture calls him JECONIAH in 1 Chronicles 3:16, 17; Esther 2:6; Jeremiah 24:1... It also calls him CONIAH in Jeremiah 22:24, 28, and JECHONIAS in Matthew 1:11-12.
Does "who had been carried away" describe Mordecai, or Kish, four names back in the list? The grammar leaves it open. Commentators differ. One answers critics who claim Mordecai himself came with Jeconiah:
Arno Clemens GaebeleinThey claim that Mordecai belonged to the captives carried away by Nebuchadnezzar. Then they say, that being the case, Mordecai must have been over 130 years old and Esther at least 70. But does it say that Nebuchadnezzar carried Mordecai away in the time of King Jeconiah? He carried away not Mordecai but his great-grandfather Kish... By listing the four generations from Kish to Mordecai, he shows how much time had passed since the banishment of Jeconiah. That banishment happened before the destruction of the temple. The four generations are an exact measure of the 120 or more years from then to the sixth year of Xerxes.
Another writer counts one generation fewer and still places Mordecai's birth long after the deportation:
Leslie M. GrantThe Babylonians had carried Mordecai's grandfather away captive. That was over 70 years earlier, so Mordecai was no doubt born in Persia. So were the great majority of Jews who lived during that captivity.
The name Kish is not neutral. It belonged to the father of Israel's first king. One writer traces the family to a royal line that lost its throne:
H. L. RossierThis Kish was no doubt of Saul's line, as his name shows... The name of Kish was famous for its link with the royal house God once set up in Israel. He then rejected that house for its unfaithfulness. We may well think that Mordecai's great-grandfather belonged to this dethroned royal family. When Cyrus gave his decree, Zerubbabel, the last representative of David's family, returned to Jerusalem with the faithful part of the tribe of Judah. Meanwhile a representative of Saul's family stayed with the ruined, rejected people.
That ancestry sets up the collision that drives the rest of the book:
Arend RemmersSaul, the son of Kish, spared Agag, king of the Amalekites, and God rejected him for his disobedience (1 Samuel 15). Mordecai, who was also a son of Kish (Esther 2:5), arranged the execution of Haman the Agagite (Esther 3:1). By this he carried out the judgment of God and gained great honour.
Cyrus had opened the door home, yet Mordecai stayed. One writer gives the reason:
H. L. RossierMordecai himself was in servitude. He had not used the decree of Cyrus to return to Jerusalem. This was not out of indifference. Like Daniel and Nehemiah, he had a responsibility to fulfil at the king's court. He could not leave without special permission, and his position probably forbade him to ask for it.
The verse introduces a man with no standing — a deportee's descendant in a foreign capital. That is the setting in which this book shows God at work unseen:
J. N. DarbyReaders have often noticed that the name of God never appears in the book of Esther. This is characteristic. God does not show Himself. The government of the world had fallen to that throne, with all its power and all its mistakes. But behind it God holds the reins by His providence. He watches over the fulfilment of His purposes and over everything needed for them. And He cares for His people, whatever their condition or the power of their enemies.
- Carried — the verse dates Mordecai's family by Jeconiah's deportation, the great captivity of 599 BC.
- Counted — commentators differ over whether the exile refers to Mordecai or to Kish. The four generations most likely cover the 120 years since.
- Kish — the name links the family to Saul's dethroned house. Saul spared Agag; Mordecai had Haman the Agagite executed.
- Kept — Mordecai stayed in Persia. One writer calls this duty at the king's court, not indifference.
- Concealed — God's name never appears in Esther. Yet He holds the reins, and He cares for His people.