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‘Esther In America,’ edited by Rabbi Dr. Halpern

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The new release, “Esther in America” is divided into seven sections containing 26 essays by scholars, rabbis, communal leaders, and writers who demonstrate how the Book of Esther has had a lasting impression upon American history.

These seven sections are: Esther In Early America, Emancipation and Proclamations, Feminist Esther, Diaspora Life and Dual Identities, Pop Culture Purim, Presidential Politics and Purim, and The Megilla and Modern Morality.

In his Introduction, the book’s editor, Rabbi Dr. Stuart W. Halpern, states that the book “has inspired and impacted the American project since its very inception. Rabbis and ethicists, abolitionists and artists, preachers and presidents, have understood the text to speak to their moment. It has offered solace to immigrants, forged solidarity, impacted politics, and, in the spirit of Esther 4:14, roused individuals to realize that deliverance was not to come from some other place, but from their own heroic actions on behalf of their people. 

“As we Americans once again find ourselves navigating antisemitism and bigotry, questioning the limits and purposes of power, reassessing gender dynamics, and grappling with how to keep an ethnically diverse empire from imploding, it is once again to Esther we must turn, to the timeless scroll that continues to urge us to find strength and redemptive possibility in the least expected of places.”

Rabbi Dr. Halpern is senior adviser to the provost and senior program officer of the Straus Center for Torah and Western Thought at Yeshiva University.