In the story of Queen Esther, one of the main characters is the man the Jews called Ahasuerus. To the Greeks, he was known as Xerxes I, or Xerxes the Great. Xerxes is the Greek version of his Persian name. In the East, he was known as Khashayarsa or Khashyar Shah. The setting of today’s episode is almost 80 years after Xerxes I takes Esther as his queen. An archivist is about to tell the story of this relationship to Darius II Nothus, the Persian king who is on his deathbed. However, before doing so, he shares ten notes about Xerxes. These are mostly historical facts and they constitute today’s top ten list.
Today’s episode explores the story of King Saul and the significance of his death in the larger context of biblical narratives and themes. Saul,...
Texts in the Old Testament (most notably in Exodus and Deuteronomy) invite us to look to the past. They exhort us to rest on...
The Bible is full of stories of ordinary people who exemplified extraordinary courage, character and faith through the lives that they lived. Bible characters...
