Sometimes known as “the Jewish Mardi Gras,” Purim is a study in opposites, an inversion of appearances. It is about the unseen forces that shape our lives, the unexpected miracles, and the hope they engender.
Nowhere in the scroll of Esther is God ever mentioned. Pur means “chance” - Purim is like a lottery. What appears to be the luck of the draw, we are taught, is actually God at work behind the scenes. We wear masks to remind ourselves that sometimes God is hidden from us, but He is present even when we can’t see Him.
As discussed in our two d’vrei Torah this past week, on the Sabbath before Purim, the Sabbath of Remembrance, we read the Torah portion about Amalek. Repentance and remembrance go together – confronting past evil helps us to transcend it (rather than to ignore, repress, and repeat.)
Jews are supposed to oppose the oppression of the weak. Deuteronomy 25:17-18 says, “Remember what Amalek did to you on your journey”… Amalek represents might over right, physical over spiritual. Ultimately we are to create a society in which no one is like Amalek. We “blot out” the name of Haman, Amalek’s descendant, with noise-makers, but we do not seek revenge. Purim reminds us not to go to war, and to treat people who are unkind to us kindly, and to do the mitzvah of getting along with other Jews, to visit our neighbors, and to help the poor.
An analogy regarding awareness of God appears in a book called What the Angel Told You, by Rabbi Noah Weinberg and Yaakov Solomon, “The title of the book is in large print before the Author is well-known. When the Author’s work is known, later on, the Author’s name appears in large print.”
As Rabbi Nachman of Breslov once said, “Remember: Things can go from the very worst to the very best…in just the blink of an eye.”