Who was Xerxes in the Bible?

Persian king to whom the enemies of the Jews made their accusation against those in Judah and Jerusalem. Ezra 4:6. He is supposed to be Cambyses, son of Cyrus.

Persian king who "reigned from India even unto Ethiopia," and took the Jewish maiden Esther to be his queen. He is held to have been Xerxes, son of Darius Hystaspis. This was in the seventh year of his reign, the year when he returned from his unsuccessful expedition against Greece. His rash conduct in repudiating his queen because she would not violate the decorum of her sex, and his giving up the whole of the Jewish people to the pride of Haman, agrees with his folly in scourging the sea and putting the engineers to death because a storm injured the bridge they had made. See ESTHER. For the succession of the Persian kings see PERSIA.

Verses 1-4. King Ahasuerus, one of the leading characters of this book, is known in history as Xerxes I. The name Ahasuerus is an appellative, which means the chief king, or the king of all kings. Xerxes, the son of Darius Hystaspes, bore this title, king of kings. This title is also given to him in the cuneiform inscriptions. One of these reads as follows: "I, the mighty king, king of kings, king of populous countries, king of this great and mighty earth, far and near." His dominion extended from East to West, even from India unto Ethiopia. He had a universal kingdom. The capital of his empire was Shushan, which had a beautiful situation surrounded by high mountains, traversed by streams and abounding in a luxurious vegetation. Since the time of King Darius it became the residence of the Persian kings. The word "palace" is better translated by fortress or castle. And in the third year of his reign he made the great feast unto all his princes, and his servants, and all the nobles of Persia and Media were before him. He then showed the riches of his glorious kingdom and entertained the nobles and princes for six months.

Esther 1. We at once plunge into a remarkable feast made by the king Ahasuerus, who, I presume, is the one who is known in profane history as Xerxes. That is a matter of no great consequence — whether it was Xerxes or Artaxerxes, or even another who has been put forward as the true answer to it. We must remember that the title of Ahasuerus was a general one, just as Pharaoh was the general one in Egypt, and Abimelech among the Philistines; that is, there were many Pharaohs and many Abimelechs. So also among the Persians there were several that bore the name of Ahasuerus. Which Ahasuerus is meant is a question, but it is a matter of no importance; if it were, God would have told us. I presume, however, that it was really Xerxes, partly because of the character of the man — a man of prodigious resources, unbounded wealth, immense luxury and vanity — a man, too, of the most arbitrary and capricious character. We shall see this in his conduct towards his wife; we shall see it, too, in his conduct towards the Jew. We shall see, accordingly, the history of a remarkable part of this capricious monarch's reign; for if there was a single Persian king with whom it might have been supposed to go hard with the Jew it was this one. Darius was a great admirer of Cyrus, and, consequently, a great friend of the Jews. Xerxes was a friend of nobody but himself. He was just simply a man who lived to please himself — to gratify his tastes and passions according to the ample means which the providence of God had placed in his hands, but which he wasted on his own luxury, as, alas! most men do.

Well, he is here shown to us in that epoch of the Persian empire when it consisted, not of 120 provinces only, which was the case when Darius the Mede, and Cyrus the Persian, reigned. We find in the Book of Daniel that there were seven provinces added afterwards through conquest. Xerxes reigned at a time, therefore, when the Persian empire was in the height of its glory and its resources, and he has all the pomp and circumstance of the empire around him — all the grandees and satraps of his vast empire. Under these circumstances it is that he calls for Vashti, who refuses to come. This provoked the capricious and arbitrary monarch. Vashti disobeyed the king. She refused according to the peculiar love of retirement which characterised Persian women. She refused to meet his wishes. He would display her beauty to all the world, and she declined. The consequence was that the king seeks counsel with his nobles, and one of them ventures upon very bold advice, namely the dismissal of Vashti. This, accordingly, is the first great step in the providence of God brought before us in the book, and all the remarkable issues follow.

The events which the book of Esther narrate to us, take place between the sixth and seventh chapters of Ezra, that is to say, between the reign of Darius (the son of Hystaspis) and the reign of Artaxerxes (surnamed "Longimanus"). The gap which separates these two reigns is filled by the reign of Ahasuerus (otherwise known as Xerxes. 485-465 B.C.), the son of Darius and the father of Artaxerxes. Thus, the events recorded in this inspired account take place under Ahasuerus (Xerxes).

Every school boy knows about the power and wealth of Xerxes, the role he played in his struggle against Greece during the Median wars, and how, in the sixth year of his reign, after he was defeated at Salamis by the fleet of his adversaries, he fled and returned to his own land. But it is useful to remind ourselves that, in order to understand the Word, even this elementary information is not necessary. One passage in Daniel (Dan. 10:20 - 11:2) is enough to familiarize us with all we need to know on the subject. On the contrary, it is important to remember at this point, that the events which fill the history of the world with their commotion, scarcely count for anything in the inspired book. God does not mention them except when they intervene in one way or another in the history of His people, or when they prefigure prophetic events, or disputes between peoples, of which Israel will be the object. (Dan. 11) It is even the case that the Word does not record the powerful collisions of nations except for one purpose: to have us witness the deliverance of just one individual among those whom He loves. (Gen. 14) This truth has a great importance for us. The conflicts among nations in our own day often preoccupy us to such a high degree, that our souls lose communion with the Lord. Let us take the Word in order to measure the value of these conflicts and let us weigh the facts in the scales of the sanctuary; how small they will seem to us in the light of our God's eternal counsels! The greatest overturnings of the greatest empires which seem to shake the world on its foundations, weigh no more than a speck in God's scales, unless His people are in question, whether it be a matter of judgment upon themselves, or of vengeance against their adversaries. (Deut. 32:8) We see an example of this in the New Testament: the tremendous task of taking the census of the entire inhabited earth, by the greatest of the Caesars, had no other result than to bring about the birth of a little Child at Bethlehem: and at the time of the end, the gigantic struggles of the greatest captains and their innumerable armies, disappear like vapor at the appearance of a single Man. In the Old Testament, the overthrowing of the world by the Assyrian and all his victories, have no importance except as God's rod against unfaithful Israel. Likewise, the victory of Babylon over Assyria has no importance except in so far as it accomplishes the same designs of God in regard to Judah.

We have a rapid survey of what was about to befall Israel in the latter days. It is the same speaker here as in Dan. 10. "Also I in the first year of Darius the Mede, even I, stood to confirm and to strengthen him. And now will I show thee the truth. Behold, there shall stand up yet three kings in Persia." There we have the succession of Persian monarchs from Cyrus. Scripture does show us who these were, although their names are not mentioned here. I would refer you to Ezra 4, where will be found these very three kings mentioned. In Ezra 4 the occasion arose out of the attempt of the enemies of Israel to stop the building of the temple; and these hired "counsellors against them to frustrate their purpose, all the days of Cyrus, king of Persia, even until the reign of Darius, king of Persia." Now in order to understand that chapter, you must bear in mind that, from the sixth verse down to the end of verse 23, is a parenthesis. The beginning and end of the chapter refer to events during the reign of Darius. But the Spirit of God goes back to show that these adversaries had been working from the days of Cyrus till the days of Darius. Consequently, in the parenthesis, from verse 6-23 inclusively, you have the various monarchs that had come between Cyrus and Darius, whose minds the adversaries had been trying to work upon. "In the reign of Ahasuerus" (i.e. the successor of Cyrus, called in profane history Cambyses), "in the beginning of his reign, wrote they to him an accusation against the inhabitants of Judah and Jerusalem." Then we have the next king. "And in the days of Artaxerxes wrote Bishlam," etc. This is a different person from the Artaxerxes mentioned in Nehemiah, who lived at a later epoch, and is called in profane history Smerdis the magician, who by wicked means acquired the crown for a time, and lent an ear to the accusations against the Jews. This usurper was put to death through a conspiracy headed by Darius, not the Mede of Daniel, but the Persian spoken of in the Book of Ezra. Darius Hystaspes was his historical name. He follows immediately. Hence we have these three kings enumerated in Ezra 4, exactly answering to the three in Daniel 11:2. Thus we find one part of Scripture throwing light upon another, without the need of going into the territories of man at all. "Behold there shall stand up yet three kings in Persia." These came after Cyrus, and were called in Scripture, as we have seen, Ahasuerus, Artaxerxes, and Darius; and in profane history Cambyses, Smerdis the magician, and Darius Hystaspes. "And the fourth shall be far richer than they all; and by his strength through his riches he shall stir up all against the realm of Grecia." It is the celebrated Xerxes, who stirred up all against Greece. This confirms an idea thrown out on a former occasion, that the reason why the he-goat rushed with such fury against Persia was in return for the Persian assault upon Greece. Xerxes was the man who made that great attempt. His riches are proverbially known, and no event made so profound an impression on the world then as that expedition against Greece and its consequences.

Here we enter on a new period in our history. Forty-seven years have passed since the dedication of the temple, approximately sixty-eight years from the time of the decree given by Cyrus. Ahasuerus (also known by the name of Xerxes), the monarch referred to in the book of Esther, the son of the Darius the Great (Hystaspis) mentioned in Ezra 5 and Ezra 6, had succeeded his father during this interval, and he had been followed on the throne by Artaxerxes his son (Artaxerxes Longimanus), who is spoken of in this chapter.

Ahasuerus was a name given to the chief king of Persia. The Ahasuerus of verse 1 is recorded in history as Xerxes 1. His empire extended over a very large area, including 127 provinces from India to Ethiopia. The capital of his empire was Shushan, a beautiful city surrounded by mountains and rich in vegetation. It is here called a citadel, for it was a fortress, a castle built not only for residence, but for military defense (v. 2).

The book of Esther deals with the fate of the Jews who remained in Babylon after the 70-year captivity was over. The Babylonian Empire had given way to the Medo-Persian Empire. King Ahasuerus (known in history as Xerxes I) ruled over the 127 provinces composing that vast empire stretching from Ethiopia to India (Esth. 1:1).

Esther had been adopted by her uncle (or cousin, see 2:7), Mordecai. Through God’s providence she receives not only the attention but the favour of the king and becomes his wife. However, Haman, an ambitious and evil character aspiring to high honours at the Persian court, is so enraged by Mordecai’s refusal to bow to him that he plots to kill not only Mordecai, but the entire Jewish race. In his quest for revenge, a decree is passed that, effectively, mandates the genocide of the Jews.

The events of the book of Esther occurred during the reign of King Ahasuerus, Xerxes I. (Persian: Khschayarscha).

Ahasuerus reigned from 485 to 464 BC. His predecessor was King Darius (522-485 BC) who is mentioned in Ezra 4:5. His successor was Artaxerxes I. (Ezra 7:1 and Nehemiah 2:1). The events mentioned in Esther therefore happened between Ezra chapter 6 and chapter 7. This is why many presume that the book was written in the second half of the fifth century BC.

The scenes of this book come in historically between chaps. 6 and 7 of the book of Ezra. We believe on internal evidence that the book was written by "Mordecai the Jew," and in the metropolis of the Persian Empire. But we would again observe that the questions of When, Where, and by Whom the books of Scripture were written are altogether irrespective of their inspiration and Divine character. The origin of the Jewish feast of Purim or of lots has its historical origin stated here — a feast yet observed and from time immemorial by the Jews. The Persian monarch Ahasuerus is the renowned Xerxes, whose history is so familiar to most readers of ancient history.