As a Psychology Professor and as a human being in general, I’m very well aware of anxiety struggles in life. I tend to be pretty open with my students about my own struggles with anxiety and related topics when relevant in class. Once at the end of a semester, a student mentioned being a Christian and asked how he could pray for me. It was an incredibly kind and thoughtful offer and I’ll always remember that.
When we look at the book of Esther in the Bible, the first thing I see is anxiety. Esther’s cousin/uncle Mordecai pacing around outside the court of women when Esther goes to live in the palace clearly presents an anxious man (Esther 2:11). And how about toward the end of the story when King Xerxes finds out about Haman’s evil plot against Esther’s people and he leaves to go do the same thing outside in the palace Garden, walking around anxiously and in torment? (Esther 7:7). It definitely looks like anxiety to me. At the story’s start, Mordecai didn’t know how he could protect his daughter Esther once she went to live in the King’s harem. Xerxes struggles with the same thing later, unsure if he can protect and fight for his beloved Queen Esther.
In my story, Mordecai’s anxiety is tied to the generational trauma of being orphaned at a young age, leaving him to be a father to his baby niece, Esther. When we first meet him, he’s having nightmares and a panic attack which is a typical occurrence in his life. Based on his personal mental health struggle and experience presented in my book, Mordecai today would be diagnosed with panic disorder and PTSD, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Later, we see him being triggered again when he finds out two soldiers are plotting against the King (Esther 2:21), and in my story he has flashbacks while running to tell Esther. We have to remember this story took place at a time where there was no modern therapy or medication for psychological issues, but Mordecai wasn’t fighting his battles alone, and he knew it. Family, faith, and social support got him through, just like social support and a positive spiritual belief system helps us all today as an integral part of our mental health.
In the case of Esther’s character, we also see generational trauma from being orphaned as a baby and being raised by a traumatized yet wonderful young uncle Mordecai. He raised her and did an excellent job, as such a loving father who also taught her about faith and how God is always with us. Still, as human beings they would always have their limitations, and at some point, Esther knew she had to care for her uncle as well. We see her as a hypervigilant individual, afraid to be happy, or even feel safe due to the tremendous traumas that had befallen her family. As a young woman entering the King’s harem, she wondered what happiness was, thinking to herself that it’s not easy to enjoy life when you are always fighting to feel safe. According to psychologist Abraham Maslow, human beings have a hierarchy of needs, safety being toward the bottom of the pyramid. Esther had a rough time feeling happy since she was always struggling to feel a sense of safety, due to her generational trauma and the after effects if had on her uncle and herself.
Regarding King Xerxes, he is of course a privileged individual. He is a king so he has wealth, power, and many wives. Still, as I always tell my students, privilege doesn’t protect us from everything and no human being is immune from hurting and pain. For Xerxes, it was no small thing to be publicly rejected by his former Queen Vashti, the ultimate personal and professional crisis and trauma he could possibly experience as King. This was particularly true for him in that he cared about finding a true partner to love and work with, just as Adam needed a partner in the beginning and God provided Eve for him (Genesis 2:18-25). Xerxes was subsequently hurt and even traumatized by this rejection, wondering if he would ever find this true partner or be able to be taken seriously as King for his beloved people. We see how this rejection affected him since he carried it into his relationship with Esther. When they first met, she could see he was still in fresh pain from this event. Not only that, but he still felt very insecure with Esther, even though they connected very well on their wedding night. Why?
The answer is once again that no human being is immune from struggles in life. Even a King can be shaken with insecurity particularly when he has been publicly rejected by a woman he thought could truly be his partner someday. In my story, we see him having an anxiety attack in his mind while waiting to see Esther again, wondering if she actually likes him or not. As I tell my students, life is hard and no one wants to feel bad. In fact, there are many things we do in our minds to make ourselves feel better, such as the self-serving bias. This means when something goes well for us, we say it went well because we are capable, strong, likable, etc. In the case of Xerxes, we see the opposite happening due to his insecurity and trauma from Vashti’s rejection. He instead engages in the self-effacing bias, thinking that he either imagined Esther’s response to him or it wasn’t about her liking him personally at all. The self-effacing bias is not nearly as common as the self-serving bias and this shows us just how affected Xerxes was from his previous trauma. We see that no one is immune.
Once again, Xerxes, Mordecai, and Esther all lived at a time before modern therapy and medicine for psychological problems and issues. However, they all knew they were not alone and Xerxes comes to find out about God from his beloved Queen Esther, becoming a believer in my story. These people knew God was with them to help fight their battles (Exodus 14:14). It gives me tremendous comfort to know there is truly nothing new under the sun and God is the ultimate healer (Ecclesiastes 1:9, Psalm 147:3). Mordecai, Esther, and Xerxes can all testify to that. May we all be reminded that God is with us each and every moment. Amen.