Esther 2:19-23--Mordecai Discovers a Plot

Esther 2:19-23
English Standard Version
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Mordecai Discovers a Plot
19 Now when the virgins were gathered together the second time, Mordecai was sitting at the king's gate. 20 Esther had not made known her kindred or her people, as Mordecai had commanded her, for Esther obeyed Mordecai just as when she was brought up by him. 21 In those days, as Mordecai was sitting at the king's gate, Bigthan and Teresh, two of the king's eunuchs, who guarded the threshold, became angry and sought to lay hands on King Ahasuerus. 22 And this came to the knowledge of Mordecai, and he told it to Queen Esther, and Esther told the king in the name of Mordecai. 23 When the affair was investigated and found to be so, the men were both hanged on the gallows. And it was recorded in the book of the chronicles in the presence of the king.

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Remember that Mordecai is outside the gate of place where Esther is being kept.  We've already been told that Esther was favored and received grace and would be selected as queen, but we're going to have a little bit of a "meanwhile, outside the palace gates" situation here if we were watching this as a play or a TV show as there would have to be set change.  We were just focusing on Esther's story arc that was going on inside the harem and the palace, but Mordecai is outside and is perfectly positioned to hear Bigthan and Teresh, two of the king's eunuchs, were on guard duty.  While they were standing guard, they were talking about all the things that made them angry about the king and how he ruled--in fact, they were so angry that they were making a plot to kill him!

Mordecai new that he could get word to Queen Esther and that if she reported this assassination attempt to the king, it would only strengthen her position in his eyes, but Esther gave credit where credit was due to Mordecai (though she did reveal her relation to him or her identity as a Jew).  The fact that Esther mentioned Mordecai's name will be important later in the story as the king will have this event in his official records.  The men who planned to assassinate the king were hanged from the gallows and the events of this plot and Mordecai's and Esther's parts in revealing the plot to the king were recorded in the royal chronicles.

We'll have another set change and be introduced to the villain of the story next time.  It would be fair to compare this man to Hitler, but that wouldn't even go far enough, because the genocide this man intended to exterminate the Jewish people far exceeded anything that Hitler had planned.  Also, remember that this is before the birth of Christ and Satan's intent here is to keep the promises of God's salvation from coming by killing His covenant people through whom Messiah was supposed to come.  Satan supposes that if he can exterminate the Jews (specifically those of the tribe of Judah, but he'll be happy to kill all of them) there will be no Messiah to defeat him, and his kingdom of darkness will reign supreme, and he will have beaten God.  That is the spiritual battle that is going on behind the scenes when we study Haman's plot next time.