Esther 6:1-9
That Night Sleep Escaped the King
1That night sleep escaped the king; so he ordered the Book of Records, the Chronicles, to be brought in and read to him.
2And there it was found recorded that Mordecai had exposed Bigthana and Teresh, two of the eunuchs who guarded the king’s entrance, when they had conspired to assassinate King Xerxes.
3The king inquired, “What honor or dignity has been bestowed on Mordecai for this act?” “Nothing has been done for him,” replied the king’s attendants.
4“Who is in the court?” the king asked. Now Haman had just entered the outer court of the palace to ask the king to hang Mordecai on the gallows he had prepared for him.
5So the king’s attendants answered him, “Haman is there, standing in the court.” “Bring him in,” ordered the king.
6Haman entered, and the king asked him, “What should be done for the man whom the king is delighted to honor?” Now Haman thought to himself, “Whom would the king be delighted to honor more than me?”
7And Haman told the king, “For the man whom the king is delighted to honor,
8have them bring a royal robe that the king himself has worn and a horse on which the king himself has ridden—one with a royal crest placed on its head.
9Let the robe and the horse be entrusted to one of the king’s most noble princes. Let them array the man the king wants to honor and parade him on the horse through the city square, proclaiming before him, ‘This is what is done for the man whom the king is delighted to honor!’”
Berean Standard Bible
That night sleep escaped the king
Six words, and the book offers no cause for them. It does not say God kept him awake. It does not say he was troubled about anything. He could not sleep, so he sent for the Book of Records and had it read to him, which is either a sensible way to get drowsy or a very strange choice, depending on how you look at it.
What the reading turns up is Mordecai. Years earlier he had exposed two of the king's own eunuchs who guarded the entrance plotting to assassinate him, and it went into the book, and there it has sat.
The king asks what honor Mordecai received for it. The attendants tell him nothing has been done. Somewhere in that palace is a filing system that never caught up with a debt, and the man who saved the king's life is still sitting at the gate with nothing.
Then the king asks who is in the court, and the timing of what follows is the whole chapter.
Now Haman had just entered the outer court of the palace to ask the king to hang Mordecai on the gallows he had prepared for him.
He is early. He built the thing last night and he could not wait for a decent hour. So the one man in the empire who most wants Mordecai dead is standing in the outer court at the exact moment the king is looking for someone to help him honor Mordecai, and the book reports it without a word of comment.
Haman is brought in, and before he can raise his own business the king asks him a question. What should be done for the man the king delights to honor?
Then comes the only time this book tells us what somebody is thinking.
Whom would the king be delighted to honor more than me?
So Haman answers the question he thinks he has been asked, and the answer shows you what he actually wants, which is neither land nor money. A royal robe the king himself has worn. A horse the king himself has ridden, with a crest on its head, led by one of the noblest princes, and a man walking in front through the city square shouting what is being done and why.
He is not asking to be rich. He is asking to be looked at, by everybody, in the open, wearing the king's own clothes.
How We Know
The chapter turns on an entry the book made earlier and left alone.
Esther 2:21 has Mordecai overhearing Bigthan and Teresh, two of the king's eunuchs who guarded the entrance, plotting against him. Esther 2:23 records that the matter was investigated and written in the Book of the Chronicles, and it records no reward.
Esther 6:2 has that record read aloud, giving the first name as Bigthana and repeating Teresh, and the king discovering the debt years later.
A detail planted without payoff, left unresolved through three chapters, and then picked up exactly where it was left, strongly supports a narrative worked out as a whole rather than assembled scene by scene.
Questions
1 What reason does the book give for the king's sleepless night?
AnswerNone at all. It says sleep escaped him. There is no dream, no warning and no explanation offered, and the writer does not name who is behind it.
2 What does the king find out when the records are read to him?
AnswerThat Mordecai exposed an assassination plot and was never given anything for it. The debt had been written down properly and then forgotten by everyone except the book.
3 Haman arrives to ask for a hanging at the exact moment the king wants advice about an honor. What does the book do with that?
AnswerNothing. It states the timing plainly and moves on. There is no comment about providence and no nudge to the reader. The events are laid out and we are left to make of them what we will.
4 Haman asks for the robe, the horse and the parade. If somebody offered you anything at all, what would come out of your mouth first?
AnswerWhatever it is says something about us, as his answer did about him. He did not ask for land or money. He asked to be seen, in the king's own clothes, with somebody shouting about it in front of him.
What This Means for Us
Nothing in this chapter is a miracle. A man cannot sleep, so somebody reads to him, and an old entry turns up, and a visitor arrives early because he is impatient. Every link is ordinary and every link is necessary, and the whole thing only works because they land in that order.
The book will not tell you who arranged it. It is perfectly content to set the pieces down and let you notice that they fit.
We usually want the sign to be unmistakable. Most of what we are given looks like this instead: a bad night, an old record, somebody turning up at the wrong moment. So look back over the last year for the small ordinary things that had to happen in the order they happened, and give the credit where you believe it belongs.
Prayer
Father, you work in bad nights and old paperwork and people arriving early, and we rarely see it while it is happening. Give us eyes for the ordinary things you are arranging. Thank you that nothing done for you is finally forgotten. Amen.