1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:08,560 Season two of Love in Context podcast welcomes you. Get ready for engaging unscripted conversations 2 00:00:08,560 --> 00:00:14,240 with your hosts, Ben and Spencer. Our mission remains unchanged to explore the Bible through 3 00:00:14,240 --> 00:00:19,880 the powerful lens of love. In this new season, we'll embark on a journey together, unearthing 4 00:00:19,880 --> 00:00:24,000 fresh insights and gaining deeper understanding of how we can love God and live out our faith 5 00:00:24,000 --> 00:00:29,360 in practical ways. So let's dive into this season of Love in Context, where love in the 6 00:00:29,360 --> 00:00:35,800 context of the Bible intersect to transform our lives. Welcome to the Love in Context 7 00:00:35,800 --> 00:00:42,880 podcast. Today, we are going to be continuing in our Kings and Kingdoms series, and we are 8 00:00:42,880 --> 00:00:48,360 going to be talking about Oshawares, or as I like to say, aha, Shoes-R-S. Yes, you nailed 9 00:00:48,360 --> 00:00:56,080 it. You nailed it. I think I've heard in the last two weeks, you pronounce his name 55 10 00:00:56,080 --> 00:01:03,800 different ways. Yeah, I'm going for 60. Yeah, so that's pretty great. Yeah. I mean, it's, 11 00:01:03,800 --> 00:01:09,560 I mean, phonetically, it does not, it should be different than how we say it. Yeah, it 12 00:01:09,560 --> 00:01:14,240 does. Well, phonetically, it just looks really weird. Yeah. By the way, I'm not even positive 13 00:01:14,240 --> 00:01:18,000 that I'm pronouncing it correctly. I just went off of what or how I heard somebody pronounce 14 00:01:18,000 --> 00:01:21,480 it. And I'm like, yeah. You all heard that. Ben is mispronouncing a word in the Bible. 15 00:01:21,480 --> 00:01:25,800 There you go. But we've been in the, so the King and Kingdom series, we've been talking 16 00:01:25,800 --> 00:01:30,720 about these non-Israelite kings and their impact on the story and also just like what 17 00:01:30,720 --> 00:01:34,920 we can learn from them as just individuals. Because a lot of times we have a tendency 18 00:01:34,920 --> 00:01:42,320 to focus on the biblical characters, which is a good reason to. Yeah. But there's a lot 19 00:01:42,320 --> 00:01:47,040 going on around them. And historically that the original readers of the text would have 20 00:01:47,040 --> 00:01:53,720 been pretty familiar with that we are not. Yes. You know, so just kind of taking a, like 21 00:01:53,720 --> 00:01:57,120 before we get into the actual biblical narrative, we want to talk briefly about, okay, so who 22 00:01:57,120 --> 00:02:02,480 is King Osuarez, right? How did he shape society? How did he shape culture? You know, things 23 00:02:02,480 --> 00:02:05,440 that we've been talking about over the last couple of weeks. So one of the first things 24 00:02:05,440 --> 00:02:10,880 we know is that he is the son of Darius I. Right? So he is the one who succeeds the guy 25 00:02:10,880 --> 00:02:17,360 we talked about last week. Yep. And so there's a few things that you remember from Darius 26 00:02:17,360 --> 00:02:21,300 that he had set up like these providences that called satraps and like there's all these 27 00:02:21,300 --> 00:02:28,120 regions that now kind of come back and they have this conversation. But like he's overseeing 28 00:02:28,120 --> 00:02:32,360 all these people who are in charge of smaller regions. And it's kind of like a upwards authority 29 00:02:32,360 --> 00:02:43,520 chain. Right? So his reign was between 486 and 465 BCE. And it came before his son, Arta 30 00:02:43,520 --> 00:02:48,200 Circeis the first. Man, I was like, I was reading his name and I was like, I don't know 31 00:02:48,200 --> 00:02:53,920 if I'm going to pronounce this right. So just, yeah, just a reminder, like Darius had been 32 00:02:53,920 --> 00:02:59,240 pushing things forward. He made it a lot more free for religions, but there was one religion 33 00:02:59,240 --> 00:03:02,960 specifically that he was pushing. We're going to come back to that because his son, not 34 00:03:02,960 --> 00:03:08,960 surprisingly does a very similar thing. Yeah. And so let's just take a look here. So Osuarez 35 00:03:08,960 --> 00:03:13,840 is actually the name is only actually used in the Bible. And the name Osuarez is actually 36 00:03:13,840 --> 00:03:17,800 literally translated in Hebrew as King. And it's one that's used in Ezra. It's used in 37 00:03:17,800 --> 00:03:23,800 Esther and it's used in Daniel to refer to Persian Kings specifically. Most scholars 38 00:03:23,800 --> 00:03:27,400 agree that the King in the time of Esther though was Xerxes the first. So if we say 39 00:03:27,400 --> 00:03:33,200 Xerxes the first or we say Osuarez, we're talking about the same person. Right? By the 40 00:03:33,200 --> 00:03:37,600 way, this is very similar to how I like in Torah and all throughout the Bible, like they 41 00:03:37,600 --> 00:03:41,360 talk about Pharaoh. Yeah. They don't talk about a specific Pharaoh. They just use the 42 00:03:41,360 --> 00:03:47,280 ruler of Egypt is Pharaoh. Right? So both in the time of when Joseph and his family 43 00:03:47,280 --> 00:03:52,320 go down to Egypt and the Pharaoh, when they're leaving Egypt, they're both just Pharaoh. 44 00:03:52,320 --> 00:03:56,920 Yeah. Right. Now, obviously those are different people, but they're, it's almost like the 45 00:03:56,920 --> 00:04:01,160 biblical account is like, Hey, this is like a typecast of who's who who's an authority 46 00:04:01,160 --> 00:04:07,120 here, but it's not a story is not about them. Yeah. Right. It's about some somebody else. 47 00:04:07,120 --> 00:04:13,640 So he ruled during the height of the Persian Empire, overseeing its vast territories and 48 00:04:13,640 --> 00:04:19,160 diverse peoples. So a few places he's talked about in history, we've talked about this 49 00:04:19,160 --> 00:04:26,200 guy before, but he is Herodias, Herodotus. I totally said that name right. The first 50 00:04:26,200 --> 00:04:35,520 time it's Herodias. No, that's definitely Herodotus. You're Herodotus. Look at it. I've 51 00:04:35,520 --> 00:04:43,600 always pronounced it Herodias. Well, let's take a look. Let's ask. Let's ask. Let's ask 52 00:04:43,600 --> 00:04:55,400 a chat how to how to pronounce that. How do you pronounce Herodotus? I shouldn't actually 53 00:04:55,400 --> 00:05:04,480 say it that way for it. That's Herodotus. Herodotus. Herodotus. So we're both wrong. 54 00:05:04,480 --> 00:05:09,740 Yep. So we're both wrong. We actually looked up the pronunciation. It's Herodotus. So Herodotus, 55 00:05:09,740 --> 00:05:14,680 he's known as one of the fathers of history. He's a fifth century Greek historian. He provides 56 00:05:14,680 --> 00:05:21,060 a comprehensive account of Xerxes the first. Some of the key details of this was the invasion 57 00:05:21,060 --> 00:05:25,200 of Greece. He describes Xerxes massive military campaign. Now, if you remember when we were 58 00:05:25,200 --> 00:05:30,560 talking about Darius the first, one of the Persia's defining features is that they have 59 00:05:30,560 --> 00:05:37,680 a lot of people. A lot of people overwhelmed. So in 480 BCE, it includes the battles of 60 00:05:37,680 --> 00:05:42,600 Thermopylae, Somalis, and Plataea. By the way, if anybody is a historian in any of these 61 00:05:42,600 --> 00:05:47,000 things and I'm saying the names wrong, just deal with it. Like that's not the... Wow, 62 00:05:47,000 --> 00:05:51,240 flashlight. I went to turn on Do Not Disturb and I hit flashlight on it. Perfect. I was 63 00:05:51,240 --> 00:05:59,600 like, man. And then so at Thermopylae, you actually may remember this story from a famous 64 00:05:59,600 --> 00:06:05,120 movie that they made. Xerxes forces defeats a small coalition of Greek city-states led 65 00:06:05,120 --> 00:06:13,760 by King Leonidas of Sparta. If you remember the movie 300, it is a retelling, creative 66 00:06:13,760 --> 00:06:20,400 retelling probably of the story of Thermopylae. That the story becomes legendary about them. 67 00:06:20,400 --> 00:06:23,800 They slow down the Persians and so they're not... Everybody else behind them is able 68 00:06:23,800 --> 00:06:30,740 to get their act together before they get in there. And he has another one. It's Salamis. 69 00:06:30,740 --> 00:06:36,560 He suffered this massive major defeat at the hands of the Greek fleet, forcing him to retreat. 70 00:06:36,560 --> 00:06:43,280 And there's conversation about how this became the beginning of the end of Persia's naval 71 00:06:43,280 --> 00:06:50,560 dominance. There is an interesting thing he's really famous for with engineers. So if you're 72 00:06:50,560 --> 00:06:55,960 an engineer, throw on your engineer hat. At the Hell's Pond bridge, he ordered the construction 73 00:06:55,960 --> 00:07:03,360 of these pontoon bridges across the Hell's Pond. It's modern day called the Darnedonellas. 74 00:07:03,360 --> 00:07:09,200 We'll go with that, yeah? Yeah, that looks right. So to actually transfer his army into 75 00:07:09,200 --> 00:07:12,800 Greece. And so it's like these temporary pontoons that they actually used to cross. And then 76 00:07:12,800 --> 00:07:16,160 when they actually crossed, it was like an engineering marvel because it was like a temporary 77 00:07:16,160 --> 00:07:28,880 bridge that he put into place. But most of Herodotus... I'm nailing these names today, 78 00:07:28,880 --> 00:07:33,960 man. If you're expecting a child anytime soon, you can take any one of the translation for 79 00:07:33,960 --> 00:07:39,120 the two names we've messed up. Yes, Ossowarez, I would recommend that. That just like flows 80 00:07:39,120 --> 00:07:45,880 off the name. It flows off the tongue. But especially like if you think of it as a bridge, 81 00:07:45,880 --> 00:07:49,180 if you think about it, when you think about these names, you got to think about like, 82 00:07:49,180 --> 00:07:55,160 if I had to yell at my child across the room, right? Ah, shoes are us. Ah, shoes are us. 83 00:07:55,160 --> 00:08:03,680 Yeah, it's probably not going to work right. So a lot of Herodotus, his details really 84 00:08:03,680 --> 00:08:09,080 emphasize Persian failures and Greek heroism. Not surprising because he's a Greek historian, 85 00:08:09,080 --> 00:08:14,760 right? So his stories are going to be maybe exaggerate some of Xerxes flaws. So Ben decided 86 00:08:14,760 --> 00:08:24,440 to hand it over to me at the name of... You guys ready for this? Ashikulus? Ashikulus? 87 00:08:24,440 --> 00:08:32,560 I'm taking it. It's a Greek tragedy writer, right? A-E-S-C-H-Y-L-U-S. Yeah. I mean, that 88 00:08:32,560 --> 00:08:37,160 sounds more like something that a sound you make when you sneeze. Ashikulus. Yeah. So 89 00:08:37,160 --> 00:08:48,160 I, full disclosure, I probably just butchered that and we're going with it. So in his play, 90 00:08:48,160 --> 00:08:55,800 he dramatizes his defeat at Somalis from the perspective of the Persian court. Yeah. And 91 00:08:55,800 --> 00:09:01,760 specifically it's dramatizing and really puffing up Xerxes as a really proud individual, right? 92 00:09:01,760 --> 00:09:04,920 That it's his pride that actually leads to the downfall of his army. Yeah. Yeah. That 93 00:09:04,920 --> 00:09:11,880 is, I believe that the Persians and it says 472 BCE is when that's actually written. There's 94 00:09:11,880 --> 00:09:21,000 a guy by the name of Ctesias of Sinaitis. Man, these guys really liked these names. 95 00:09:21,000 --> 00:09:24,120 And he's a Greek physician who worked in the Persian court from fifth century BCE. So he 96 00:09:24,120 --> 00:09:29,980 wrote a history of Persia and his accounts of Xerxes are a lot less detailed than the 97 00:09:29,980 --> 00:09:33,800 other others, but they offer some alternate perspectives such as like court intrigue and 98 00:09:33,800 --> 00:09:38,480 Persian culture. But unfortunately, like most of the manuscripts from like these times, 99 00:09:38,480 --> 00:09:41,680 most of it didn't survive. So they have pieces. They have pieces of it and they have to kind 100 00:09:41,680 --> 00:09:46,840 of push it together. Yeah. But then a very familiar name, Josephus, right? He is one 101 00:09:46,840 --> 00:09:52,520 of the first century Jewish historians. He actually refers to Xerxes as Ossowar as he's 102 00:09:52,520 --> 00:09:57,400 talking about the book of Esther. That's actually a lot of reasons that we associate Xerxes 103 00:09:57,400 --> 00:10:05,160 with that time as well as other historical evidence. Other greater Greek writers and 104 00:10:05,160 --> 00:10:13,920 Roman writers like Plutarch, by the way, naming kids, Diodorus, these are good names, Cericulus. 105 00:10:13,920 --> 00:10:17,320 They mentioned Xerxes in their broader histories of Persia, often highlighting their military 106 00:10:17,320 --> 00:10:26,320 campaign and then interaction with the Greeks. So he's pretty well documented in history, 107 00:10:26,320 --> 00:10:31,120 which is why they don't have any trouble placing him in the story of Esther and of what was 108 00:10:31,120 --> 00:10:36,580 going on. And we talked about that a few weeks ago where the further we get in the series, 109 00:10:36,580 --> 00:10:40,200 the more documentation we're going to have. Yeah. I think next week we're talking about 110 00:10:40,200 --> 00:10:44,000 Herod the Great and there's literally more things to talk about than I have places to 111 00:10:44,000 --> 00:10:47,960 put them. It would be like a four hour episode. And then after that, we're going to talk about 112 00:10:47,960 --> 00:10:54,000 Caesar Augustus. Yeah, right. I don't even think we have time to record that. You know, 113 00:10:54,000 --> 00:10:59,640 I definitely don't have time to edit it, especially with the way we're pronouncing names today. 114 00:10:59,640 --> 00:11:04,400 So he I just want to touch on a few, a few inscriptions, archaeological things that are 115 00:11:04,400 --> 00:11:11,480 going on. So there's a bunch of inscriptions that were left talking about Xerxes at Persepolis. 116 00:11:11,480 --> 00:11:18,120 He also has dedicated inscriptions detailing his dedications to Zoroastrianism. Remember 117 00:11:18,120 --> 00:11:24,200 we talked about that last week, the primary religion of his empire and his efforts to 118 00:11:24,200 --> 00:11:29,000 maintain or within it. So there's also some archaeological evidence that Xerxes went and 119 00:11:29,000 --> 00:11:33,200 destroyed temples and statues associated with local religions. Good examples are Babylon 120 00:11:33,200 --> 00:11:39,560 and Egypt as part of his attempt to center center practice around Zoroastrianism. The 121 00:11:39,560 --> 00:11:44,080 Babylon Escalia Chronicle mentions Xerxes suppressing revolts in Babylon and potentially 122 00:11:44,080 --> 00:11:47,600 desecrating the Temple of Marduk. That's actually really interesting. You should actually go 123 00:11:47,600 --> 00:11:52,080 read on that. That's about the worship of Marduk. You're going to find some really interesting 124 00:11:52,080 --> 00:11:55,600 connections into biblical narrative. Not not our point today. We talked about the Hell 125 00:11:55,600 --> 00:12:00,360 Pond Bridge, the modern architecture and how he shows up. He shows up in both Babylonian 126 00:12:00,360 --> 00:12:04,680 and Egyptian records specifically because both of those regions he quelled rebellions. 127 00:12:04,680 --> 00:12:08,520 Yes, he brought in the army to call rebellions. Now remember we talked about there's a sat 128 00:12:08,520 --> 00:12:15,400 traps and they're all in charge of these different regions. Great. But if they rebel, 129 00:12:15,400 --> 00:12:18,720 now you got to come in and usually you're having to take out a few people because they 130 00:12:18,720 --> 00:12:25,800 they combine together to try to rebel. Yeah. So some key events of his reign is that he 131 00:12:25,800 --> 00:12:30,040 failed to invade Greece. Right. That's one of that's actually probably the most well 132 00:12:30,040 --> 00:12:35,560 known for Xerxes the first in the Greco-Persian Wars. And most of you who've gone through 133 00:12:35,560 --> 00:12:40,400 history actually probably remember that from your world history classes. The Thermopylae 134 00:12:40,400 --> 00:12:53,200 and Salamis. Those are the big examples. So with that, because of that, he actually failed 135 00:12:53,200 --> 00:12:56,600 to consolidate the Greek territories that he had actually inherited from his father 136 00:12:56,600 --> 00:13:02,400 because his father had actually been defeated at Marathon in 490. And despite the immense 137 00:13:02,400 --> 00:13:08,320 amount of resources that Xerxes actually devotes to this conquering of Greece, just can't do 138 00:13:08,320 --> 00:13:14,920 it. Right. He's not able to subjugate its city-states, leaving it largely independent. 139 00:13:14,920 --> 00:13:20,040 So it marks this turning point in the Greco-Persian Wars, shifting the balance of power toward 140 00:13:20,040 --> 00:13:26,160 the Greeks. Right. So we're starting to see in the life of Ossowar as you're starting 141 00:13:26,160 --> 00:13:31,840 to see the decline of Persia, which is going to lead to the rise of Greece. Yes. Of course, 142 00:13:31,840 --> 00:13:36,000 then you're going to see the decline of Greece into the rise of Rome. Right. If you're a 143 00:13:36,000 --> 00:13:40,640 student of history, you know what we're talking about. Ossowar is also, he did have some infrastructural 144 00:13:40,640 --> 00:13:46,000 achievements where he did maintain and expand the Persian Royal Road, which that was that 145 00:13:46,000 --> 00:13:50,480 network that we talked about where they could actually deliver messages faster than Amazon 146 00:13:50,480 --> 00:13:56,720 get packages to Alaska. All right. So careful. Jeff Bezos is going to listen and get really 147 00:13:56,720 --> 00:14:03,520 get on us. Well, I'm not wrong. So you're not wrong. So that's, that's one of the achievements 148 00:14:03,520 --> 00:14:09,160 that he had was he was actually able to help maintain that and expand that. And then he 149 00:14:09,160 --> 00:14:17,640 also had some achievements as far as monumental status. He built colossal winged bowls at 150 00:14:17,640 --> 00:14:26,320 the gate of all nations, blending Mesopotamian, Mesopotamian and Persian styles. Right. So 151 00:14:26,320 --> 00:14:30,960 he was doing a thing where he was trying to blend things together to be like, no, we are 152 00:14:30,960 --> 00:14:37,080 Ossos active unification to be like, we are one people. Right. Right. Which also focusing 153 00:14:37,080 --> 00:14:43,360 on multilingualism, multilingualism. That's a hard word. Word. That is a difficult word. 154 00:14:43,360 --> 00:14:48,160 I'm picking hard words today. We're doing, but taking all the languages and actually 155 00:14:48,160 --> 00:14:51,480 making sure that like all these languages are actually being understood throughout the 156 00:14:51,480 --> 00:14:56,520 country. Yeah. The road systems is really important because one of the things we talked 157 00:14:56,520 --> 00:15:00,920 about in Darius with them developing this railroad system is that when Christianity 158 00:15:00,920 --> 00:15:05,520 shows up and Rome has now made all these roads everywhere because it's like, it becomes a 159 00:15:05,520 --> 00:15:09,960 thing moving forward. It actually allows for the spread of Christianity at a rapid pace 160 00:15:09,960 --> 00:15:15,720 because of that. It's almost like God knows what his timing is doing. Yep. Right. One 161 00:15:15,720 --> 00:15:20,480 of the things that's going to be important to the narrative today is he also consolidated 162 00:15:20,480 --> 00:15:26,440 the city to Susa became his, it became his city that he reigns from. Yep. Yep. So you, 163 00:15:26,440 --> 00:15:32,560 when you get to this biblical narrative, right? Yep. That's where we are. So this, where you 164 00:15:32,560 --> 00:15:36,880 actually see the start of this is actually an Esther one versus one through nine, where 165 00:15:36,880 --> 00:15:42,920 it actually talks about our Oshawa is as wealth and power. Yep. Right. So this guy, and when 166 00:15:42,920 --> 00:15:46,480 they're describing it and just to paraphrase it here real quick, when they're describing 167 00:15:46,480 --> 00:15:49,880 it, they're not describing like, oh yeah, he's semi wealthy. They're not saying that 168 00:15:49,880 --> 00:15:55,720 there's, they're, they're actually equating him to Jeff Bezos status. Like being like, 169 00:15:55,720 --> 00:16:01,120 so we quoted him twice. We may get flagged. We might. Yeah. They're equating him to Elon 170 00:16:01,120 --> 00:16:07,520 Musk status. There we go. Um, so use whichever one you want. Yeah. Actually, if you look 171 00:16:07,520 --> 00:16:10,400 here, uh, so I just want to point out a couple of things because we've already talked about 172 00:16:10,400 --> 00:16:14,200 historical context to Persia verse one of chapter one of Esther. This is what happened 173 00:16:14,200 --> 00:16:20,080 during the time of Oshawa is, uh, the, the Xerxes who ruled over 127 provinces, stretching 174 00:16:20,080 --> 00:16:24,000 from India to Kush at that time, King Xerxes. I'm just going to use Xerxes because that's 175 00:16:24,000 --> 00:16:28,680 within the biblical, uh, translated English, even though it's actually Oshawa is in Hebrew. 176 00:16:28,680 --> 00:16:32,680 Yeah. Uh, reigned from his Royal throne in the Citadel of Susa. And then the third year 177 00:16:32,680 --> 00:16:35,380 of his reign, he gave a banquet for all his nobles and officials, the military leaders 178 00:16:35,380 --> 00:16:40,040 of Persia, the princes and the noble nobles of the provinces were present for a full 180 179 00:16:40,040 --> 00:16:44,060 days. He displayed the vast wealth of the kingdom and the splendid glory of his majesty. 180 00:16:44,060 --> 00:16:47,220 When those days were over, the King gave a banquet lasting seven days in the enclosed 181 00:16:47,220 --> 00:16:50,960 garden of the King's palace for all the people from the least to the greatest who were in 182 00:16:50,960 --> 00:16:56,560 the Citadel of Susa. Okay. So 127 providence is from India to Ethiopia. He hosts 180 day 183 00:16:56,560 --> 00:17:01,820 festival. This is massive display of just like power wealth, all these different things. 184 00:17:01,820 --> 00:17:05,960 So the question is why is he doing this? Uh, there's a book I'm going to recommend written 185 00:17:05,960 --> 00:17:10,080 by Rabbi David Foreman. It's called the queen. You thought, you know, um, he gets into some 186 00:17:10,080 --> 00:17:13,240 of the things going on in Oshawa and we're just going to be like skimming a stone across 187 00:17:13,240 --> 00:17:17,560 the front, but he's got, it's a really good deep dive into his, uh, into the book of Esther. 188 00:17:17,560 --> 00:17:22,840 So to give you guys kind of an idea of the kingdom he ruled, uh, uh, this is according 189 00:17:22,840 --> 00:17:30,840 to a quick Google search, right? It is about 6,827 kilometers to get from India to Ethiopia, 190 00:17:30,840 --> 00:17:37,480 which would go up into Kush. Yeah. Right. So, um, that right there is actually bigger than 191 00:17:37,480 --> 00:17:41,280 the span that you would act is actually a little bit bigger than the span from East 192 00:17:41,280 --> 00:17:44,920 coast to West coast in the United States. Right. If you leave, if you leave on Alaska, 193 00:17:44,920 --> 00:17:52,000 um, but so this kingdom that he's ruling is massive. Yeah. And, and definitely bigger 194 00:17:52,000 --> 00:17:56,400 than anything they've seen up to this point. So there's, and there's 127 providences. So 195 00:17:56,400 --> 00:17:59,120 we talked about these sat traps and we talked about these people who are in charge of these 196 00:17:59,120 --> 00:18:04,360 regions. So he's got sat traps. He's got princes. He's got people who like rule over regions. 197 00:18:04,360 --> 00:18:09,160 He's got all these people at his, at his place and he's throwing 180 day festival to, uh, 198 00:18:09,160 --> 00:18:14,840 to show them the wealth, the power, the prestige of Persia. Why is that important? 180 days. 199 00:18:14,840 --> 00:18:20,440 180 days. That's a lot. It's a lot. It's a lot of partying. And then after that he does 200 00:18:20,440 --> 00:18:25,560 a, uh, he does a seven day banquet in Susa for all the great and small people who are 201 00:18:25,560 --> 00:18:33,120 there. Now, why is he doing this? Because as the ruler of Persia, you need all these 202 00:18:33,120 --> 00:18:38,600 people on board with you. Right? Cause I, this is not, this is not Nebuchadnezzar. This 203 00:18:38,600 --> 00:18:42,480 is not, I rule with an iron fist. You do what I say or a trap your head off. Right? This 204 00:18:42,480 --> 00:18:48,320 is, this is Darius the first, this is Xerxes the first. They are, they are, um, yes, they're 205 00:18:48,320 --> 00:18:52,080 all powerful. They're in charge of the entire region, but they actually need the support 206 00:18:52,080 --> 00:18:55,880 of their, I'm going to call them underlings. They need support of their underlings in order 207 00:18:55,880 --> 00:19:01,680 to actually move forward. Like, and, and that's going to be a big, uh, big piece of understanding 208 00:19:01,680 --> 00:19:06,200 us wires throughout the story. Right? Yeah. And you need to also understand, like you 209 00:19:06,200 --> 00:19:11,600 need to understand his personality a little bit, right? He is an ambitious and indulgent 210 00:19:11,600 --> 00:19:17,160 individual. Correct. Right? Like he's, uh, I, I would go as far as say he's gluttonous. 211 00:19:17,160 --> 00:19:21,320 Oh, absolutely. Like, um, so he's, he has this huge amount of ambition. He wants to 212 00:19:21,320 --> 00:19:25,480 show how great powerful he is. He's not just going to do that, but like, look at everything 213 00:19:25,480 --> 00:19:29,800 I have. He's like, I am so powerful. I can throw 180 day party. We can be gluttonous 214 00:19:29,800 --> 00:19:34,960 for half a year. Right? And then we'll, then we'll party some more. Right? And we'll just 215 00:19:34,960 --> 00:19:41,080 be indulgent gluttonous people. And this is how wealthy I am, how powerful I am. So with, 216 00:19:41,080 --> 00:19:45,640 uh, Oshawa is you have this gluttonous personality. You have this prideful personality. You have 217 00:19:45,640 --> 00:19:51,800 this ambitious personality, um, which spoiler alert eventually leads to the downfall of 218 00:19:51,800 --> 00:19:55,440 the Persian empire. Yeah. I want to read this actually from, uh, cause this is leading into 219 00:19:55,440 --> 00:19:59,840 the next portion of where, where, what happens at this banquet. Uh, it says in verse 10, 220 00:19:59,840 --> 00:20:04,320 uh, so his wife, queen Vashti was running a separate banquet at the same time for the 221 00:20:04,320 --> 00:20:07,400 women because this is very patriarchal culture. The women are going to be separate from the 222 00:20:07,400 --> 00:20:12,120 men. Um, also after 180 dudes of days of dudes partying, you probably don't want to be around 223 00:20:12,120 --> 00:20:16,720 them anyways. They probably smell. Yeah. But, um, it says in verse 10 of chapter, chapter 224 00:20:16,720 --> 00:20:23,560 one on the seventh day when King Xerxes was in high spirits from wine. Yeah. He's drunk. 225 00:20:23,560 --> 00:20:27,120 He commanded the seven eunuchs who served him, by the way, eunuchs are people who are 226 00:20:27,120 --> 00:20:33,080 not going to have, hmm, what's a good way to say that they can't have relations. They 227 00:20:33,080 --> 00:20:38,080 can't have relations. So they're the good ones to go get your wife. Right. Um, and then 228 00:20:38,080 --> 00:20:41,480 to bring before him queen Vashti wearing her royal crown in order to display her beauty 229 00:20:41,480 --> 00:20:47,820 to the peoples and noble for she was lovely to look at. Um, now, first of all, the first 230 00:20:47,820 --> 00:20:51,520 thing I want to point out is that Persian queens, um, held power, but were expected 231 00:20:51,520 --> 00:20:56,720 to remain in the royal harem and follow strict social norms. So her refusal to meet, it was 232 00:20:56,720 --> 00:21:02,880 already out of the norms to call her out there to be at the party. Yep. It was already like 233 00:21:02,880 --> 00:21:08,360 questionable social mores, right? Um, there is some conversation in the Babylonian Talmud 234 00:21:08,360 --> 00:21:12,520 about whether or not, like that, uh, they suggest that when he invite tells her to show 235 00:21:12,520 --> 00:21:16,680 up in a royal crown, the implication is the royal crown and nothing else. Yeah. Now that 236 00:21:16,680 --> 00:21:24,240 is subjective, but it would also add to this level of outside of the social norms, right? 237 00:21:24,240 --> 00:21:30,240 Uh, that he's trying to display what, what is, what is his. And so her divine to her 238 00:21:30,240 --> 00:21:35,480 defiance in this, in this place, uh, even though it, um, it is outside of the social 239 00:21:35,480 --> 00:21:41,320 norms, her defiance is seen as a direct opposition to his power and his authority. Now, why is 240 00:21:41,320 --> 00:21:45,480 he having this party? Because he's trying to get these people to rally behind him in 241 00:21:45,480 --> 00:21:49,760 order for him to go to war, to take conquest, to take over more areas, to continue to push 242 00:21:49,760 --> 00:21:53,840 his influence forward. And so he's already known for being impulsive, quick tempered 243 00:21:53,840 --> 00:22:00,320 and apparently seven days into a wine high. Right. And, uh, and then it says that his 244 00:22:00,320 --> 00:22:05,120 advisors, uh, play a key role in his decision making and suggest deposing Vashti to preserve 245 00:22:05,120 --> 00:22:09,840 preserve his authority. All right. Now this is important because it's already going to 246 00:22:09,840 --> 00:22:15,960 be apparent that, uh, Xerxes in this, in this story is going to defer to a lot of the judgment 247 00:22:15,960 --> 00:22:21,320 of his advisors. Why is that going to be important? Well, we'll get there, but he, he listens 248 00:22:21,320 --> 00:22:26,200 to his advisors. He allows them to have, uh, input into his ears and he, it typically causes 249 00:22:26,200 --> 00:22:31,680 that he makes decisions, rash, impertinent decisions that have big implications for his 250 00:22:31,680 --> 00:22:35,740 community because Vashti, when he married her would have been for a political reason 251 00:22:35,740 --> 00:22:40,960 to begin with. So having her, uh, taken out of the court, divorcing her, killing her, 252 00:22:40,960 --> 00:22:45,800 depending on how you read that, not, not going to be a good look for his reign. Yeah. Like 253 00:22:45,800 --> 00:22:48,420 it's going to cause problems. Yes. You're the most powerful person in the world, but 254 00:22:48,420 --> 00:22:52,120 you also have an entire country that needs to rally around you. And apparently Vashti 255 00:22:52,120 --> 00:22:59,320 was pretty well thought of. So, and Persian decrees, um, they're the, because we're not 256 00:22:59,320 --> 00:23:02,000 Nebuchadnezzar where he said one thing and then he was like, you know what, actually 257 00:23:02,000 --> 00:23:05,880 I just, I'm changing my mind. We're going to do this and he doesn't have the iron, iron 258 00:23:05,880 --> 00:23:09,840 fist, right? The, when the Persian decrees are made, they're made irrevocable. We're 259 00:23:09,840 --> 00:23:13,960 going to see this later in Esther eight eight when, when we're at the end of the story. 260 00:23:13,960 --> 00:23:21,640 Um, so when he makes this decree, he's, um, it likely served as propaganda to reinforce 261 00:23:21,640 --> 00:23:27,240 his authority and also, uh, to perpetuate this authority of man over woman in their 262 00:23:27,240 --> 00:23:31,760 country as well, which is not great. So now you have, uh, where Esther comes into the 263 00:23:31,760 --> 00:23:35,860 story and this is, uh, starting at Esther chapter two. And incidentally, my wife does 264 00:23:35,860 --> 00:23:40,480 like Esther's name. So in Hebrew it's Hadassah. So if you are thinking about naming a little 265 00:23:40,480 --> 00:23:46,360 girl Hadassah is a great name. Hadassah Esther. Yeah. Hadassah Esther. Yeah. Yeah. Um, so, 266 00:23:46,360 --> 00:23:51,440 uh, if you have your Bible, go ahead and turn to it, go to Esther two, one through 18. I'm 267 00:23:51,440 --> 00:23:55,120 going to give an overview. Ben's probably going to read some verses out there as well. 268 00:23:55,120 --> 00:24:02,160 Okay. But so at this point, Oshawa is starts looking for a new queen. Okay. Um, and so 269 00:24:02,160 --> 00:24:08,120 the, his advisors, they're bringing beautiful women into the court and being like, do any 270 00:24:08,120 --> 00:24:12,480 of these people please you? So again, this also says something about the society that 271 00:24:12,480 --> 00:24:17,920 they're living in, right? There is very patriarchal. So he's not, they're not being like, Hey, 272 00:24:17,920 --> 00:24:21,700 this person has good education. This person knows a lot. This person speaks well. He's 273 00:24:21,700 --> 00:24:27,080 they're like, here's a bunch of hot babes. Which one do you like? Okay. We're not saying 274 00:24:27,080 --> 00:24:31,480 this is the right way to select a mate. We're saying this is culturally what's going on 275 00:24:31,480 --> 00:24:36,700 right now. Uh, side note, we both disagree with that, this method, but this is what's 276 00:24:36,700 --> 00:24:43,540 going on right now. Okay. So Esther was a Jewish woman who was raised by her cousin 277 00:24:43,540 --> 00:24:48,720 Mordecai. Okay. Another great name, by the way, you can also tell which names we've said 278 00:24:48,720 --> 00:24:53,120 more often when we're reading the texts, like cause Mordecai, we didn't even hesitate. No, 279 00:24:53,120 --> 00:24:58,800 no. Yeah. We're not also not going to hesitate with Haman, you know? Yeah. Yeah. Right. Right. 280 00:24:58,800 --> 00:25:09,040 So, uh, so Esther raised by Mordecai is selected to be come the new queen of Persia, of the 281 00:25:09,040 --> 00:25:13,120 Persian empire. Yes. And the, the biggest thing to take away from this chapter, cause we're 282 00:25:13,120 --> 00:25:15,640 not actually going to spend a lot of time talking about Esther, because even though 283 00:25:15,640 --> 00:25:21,900 it's a great story, King or Queen, you thought you knew great, great book. Yeah. Right. Um, 284 00:25:21,900 --> 00:25:25,360 but the biggest thing that's important to the way that the story plays out and specifically 285 00:25:25,360 --> 00:25:29,680 we're talking about the King is that nobody knows that she's a Jew except for Mordecai. 286 00:25:29,680 --> 00:25:33,280 Yeah. Um, they have no idea where she comes from. Now, once again, what you're like, Oh, 287 00:25:33,280 --> 00:25:37,480 how could that even be the case? Well, because also what's also where he's been doing though, 288 00:25:37,480 --> 00:25:41,920 but he's been, he's been mingling everybody together. He's taken away like, uh, identifying 289 00:25:41,920 --> 00:25:46,080 marks like language, culture, uh, practices, all these different things that people are 290 00:25:46,080 --> 00:25:50,600 familiar with that identify themselves. They're actually becoming more of a melting pot, right? 291 00:25:50,600 --> 00:25:54,520 So it's not going to be a normal thing. Like you're not going to see a young Jewish girl 292 00:25:54,520 --> 00:25:58,880 in exile and necessarily think, Oh, Jewish, because of the way that they dress and because 293 00:25:58,880 --> 00:26:04,600 of their practices and things, because it's just not going to be the same. And so, um, 294 00:26:04,600 --> 00:26:07,080 that's really important because then we come into chapter three and there's this guy by 295 00:26:07,080 --> 00:26:11,840 the name of Haman. Now Haman is an agogite. So who is an agogite? Do you know where they 296 00:26:11,840 --> 00:26:17,600 come from? I actually don't. They come from the Malachites who were a thorn in the side 297 00:26:17,600 --> 00:26:21,680 of the ancient Israelites. Now, if you remember back to Exodus 17, when we were having this 298 00:26:21,680 --> 00:26:26,600 story about these, this desert dwelling, uh, raiding people, like I call them like the 299 00:26:26,600 --> 00:26:30,920 desert people, the sand people, but from star wars, but they're, you know, Tuscan Raiders, 300 00:26:30,920 --> 00:26:34,960 the Tuscan Raiders. Thank you. I knew that. Yeah. Tuscan Raiders. They're like the Tuscan 301 00:26:34,960 --> 00:26:38,560 Raiders. They're out in the middle of the, of the desert and they tend to pick on these 302 00:26:38,560 --> 00:26:43,160 clans and specifically they go and attack the weakest portion of the clan. Yes. So the 303 00:26:43,160 --> 00:26:46,200 Malachites were known to be desert Raiders and they would always go after the weakest 304 00:26:46,200 --> 00:26:49,120 people in your, in your place. So they're usually the people who are struggling on the 305 00:26:49,120 --> 00:26:55,800 back. Incidentally, that's why God instructs the biggest tribe to go in front and the second 306 00:26:55,800 --> 00:27:00,760 biggest tribe in the back, in the back, because you always keep your weak in the middle because 307 00:27:00,760 --> 00:27:05,600 they're, they're meant to be protected. Um, so that's, that's who, that's who they are. 308 00:27:05,600 --> 00:27:09,360 And then they also talk about them at first Samuel 15. Um, and it, and they, there's just 309 00:27:09,360 --> 00:27:14,320 a history of hostile hostility toward the Jewish people. So if you're reading this book 310 00:27:14,320 --> 00:27:21,880 and you're a Jew and you say, Hey, man, the Agagite and they go, Oh, Oh, there's an Agagite. 311 00:27:21,880 --> 00:27:29,120 That's not good. Yeah. Um, Agagite actually connecting to King Agog, right? Um, so, uh, 312 00:27:29,120 --> 00:27:36,460 he is, he's a huge deal. And so he gets promoted by Osowares, um, probably because, you know, 313 00:27:36,460 --> 00:27:40,640 he's descendant of a King. He's, he's probably got authority. He's got some influence in 314 00:27:40,640 --> 00:27:46,040 the region, but he gets, he gets elevated for some reason, um, to the point that, uh, 315 00:27:46,040 --> 00:27:51,040 um, he actually starts asking people to bow down in his presence. He says, uh, and so, 316 00:27:51,040 --> 00:27:55,400 uh, bowing in the Persian court culture, uh, would have been submission to the Persian 317 00:27:55,400 --> 00:28:00,200 court. So Mordecai's refusal, sorry, I was trying to get ahead of myself. He tells the 318 00:28:00,200 --> 00:28:03,640 everybody that have to bow down in his presence, but there's a guy by the name of Mordecai who 319 00:28:03,640 --> 00:28:09,000 we've heard about already. He's the uncle of Esther who just won't do it. Now that's 320 00:28:09,000 --> 00:28:13,280 a problem for Mordecai because if you don't bow when you're supposed to, it's seen as 321 00:28:13,280 --> 00:28:15,680 an affront to the Persian court. 322 00:28:15,680 --> 00:28:20,040 Side, side note and Esther in this part of the story, it doesn't specifically say why 323 00:28:20,040 --> 00:28:26,720 Mordecai doesn't bow. Correct. Right. Uh, it's likely because of religious reasons. Yeah. 324 00:28:26,720 --> 00:28:31,040 Likely because of his faith in God. It's, it might be because he knew he, he's an Agagite. 325 00:28:31,040 --> 00:28:36,360 Yeah. Right. Right. He doesn't, we don't know. Uh, so just, uh, I've, I've heard people preach 326 00:28:36,360 --> 00:28:39,800 on this and they immediately jumped to this because he was a faithful man of God. And 327 00:28:39,800 --> 00:28:43,520 we're like, we actually don't know that. Yeah. We don't know that. All we know is that he 328 00:28:43,520 --> 00:28:49,640 didn't bow. Right. So Haman is not thrilled about it because, uh, if you give somebody 329 00:28:49,640 --> 00:28:53,160 a little bit of power, then they're going to corrupt that power. Absolutely. Um, and 330 00:28:53,160 --> 00:28:58,960 so he goes to Osuarez and he makes a statement. He says that, uh, the Jews are following completely 331 00:28:58,960 --> 00:29:01,840 separate laws. That's a big deal in this culture where everybody's supposed to be following 332 00:29:01,840 --> 00:29:06,960 a standard law. Right. And they're, uh, exploiting fears of disloyalty in this diverse Persian 333 00:29:06,960 --> 00:29:10,480 population. They're trying to be, they're trying to take away from what you're trying 334 00:29:10,480 --> 00:29:14,600 to do. Xerxes, Xerxes. You're trying to take away from who you're trying to become. Yeah. 335 00:29:14,600 --> 00:29:18,320 They're essentially, he's, he's spreading this lie being like, they're trying to revolt. 336 00:29:18,320 --> 00:29:22,660 Yeah. Which by the way, in earlier in our episode, we talked about how our Oshawa is 337 00:29:22,660 --> 00:29:27,280 actually put down revolts. So, I mean, he's going to be kind of, kind of sensitive to 338 00:29:27,280 --> 00:29:33,760 that. Right. So then, uh, the King in a typical move, because he, he tends to, uh, just do 339 00:29:33,760 --> 00:29:39,720 whatever his advisors tell him to do, approves Haman's plan without investigating it at all. 340 00:29:39,720 --> 00:29:43,080 He was like, yep, sounds good to me. Here we go. Let's go and eliminate the Jews. No 341 00:29:43,080 --> 00:29:49,800 investigation. Uh, and so he's completely detached, uh, from the, the, the responsibility 342 00:29:49,800 --> 00:29:53,460 of kingship, right? Because if something's being brought here, like you're going to go 343 00:29:53,460 --> 00:29:57,800 put it on a rebellion of an entire people, you should probably make sure that those reports 344 00:29:57,800 --> 00:30:05,060 are true before you go and do that. And at this point, uh, you have Esther who then goes 345 00:30:05,060 --> 00:30:10,360 before the King at the potential penalty of death for going before the King uninvited 346 00:30:10,360 --> 00:30:15,440 to be like, Hey, I'm a Jew and the rest of the Jews, we're not trying to do this. We're 347 00:30:15,440 --> 00:30:20,440 not trying to revolt. We're not trying to uprising and pleads for their lives. Right. 348 00:30:20,440 --> 00:30:27,120 Now she does this at the risk of her own life. Okay. Um, and Esther and Oshawa is extends 349 00:30:27,120 --> 00:30:35,240 his golden scepter was sparing her life. So he shows mercy. Um, and then, uh, he offers 350 00:30:35,240 --> 00:30:42,000 up half of her kingdom and she invites her kingdom. No, he offers up half of his kingdom 351 00:30:42,000 --> 00:30:51,840 and she invites him, uh, invites him and Haman to a banquet. It's, I mean, it's crazy because 352 00:30:51,840 --> 00:30:55,960 you think that like, if you were Esther, right at this point and he offers you up to half 353 00:30:55,960 --> 00:31:00,080 his kingdom, you're like, Hey, can you just not kill the Jews? Yeah. Right. Right. That'd 354 00:31:00,080 --> 00:31:05,560 be cool. But once again, still neither Haman nor Oshawa is know that she's a Jew. So she 355 00:31:05,560 --> 00:31:09,920 invites, uh, the King and Haman to a dinner. Now, one of the things I think that Rabbi 356 00:31:09,920 --> 00:31:14,000 David Foreman does a really good job of kind of unpacking here in the language is she's 357 00:31:14,000 --> 00:31:19,280 building a lot of tension between Oshawa and Haman. Yeah. So imagine, imagine if you're 358 00:31:19,280 --> 00:31:24,920 like, uh, your, your spouse comes in and you're, you're super happy with them and you're like, 359 00:31:24,920 --> 00:31:29,320 man, just, I love you so much. I'll give you whatever you want. And they're like, let's 360 00:31:29,320 --> 00:31:40,960 have dinner with this person and us. What? Like what? And then, then they have dinner 361 00:31:40,960 --> 00:31:44,160 and then it comes to the end of the day and you're like, man, I love you so much. Like 362 00:31:44,160 --> 00:31:48,600 you can have whatever you want. And they're like, can we have another dinner with us and 363 00:31:48,600 --> 00:31:55,720 this person? And so it says that, uh, Oshawa has trouble sleeping in chapter six. I wonder 364 00:31:55,720 --> 00:32:00,840 why I wonder why he's having trouble sleeping. Right. It's not, not the fact that his queen 365 00:32:00,840 --> 00:32:06,280 that he's very enamored with keeps inviting this guy, extra guy over to the, to the mill, 366 00:32:06,280 --> 00:32:10,000 right? Nothing to do with that. Right. He finds out that Mordecai had earlier in the 367 00:32:10,000 --> 00:32:15,560 story, uh, uncovered a plot to assassinate him. And so he calls in Haman and he's like, 368 00:32:15,560 --> 00:32:18,520 Hey, what should I do for somebody that the King really loves now? Haman being very proud 369 00:32:18,520 --> 00:32:22,760 of himself and being like, man, I'm, I'm super famous. Like I'm going to dinners with the 370 00:32:22,760 --> 00:32:26,960 King and the queen and not realizing that there's probably a freight train coming at 371 00:32:26,960 --> 00:32:31,680 that light at the end of the tunnel. Right. He's like, well, you should probably, uh, 372 00:32:31,680 --> 00:32:36,040 put your royal robe on him and let him ride your, your, your horse through town and people 373 00:32:36,040 --> 00:32:40,720 should sing his praises talking about how great he is. He's like, great. So you know, 374 00:32:40,720 --> 00:32:45,480 Mordecai, you know, Mordecai, that guy, that guy. So he saved my life. We should, we should 375 00:32:45,480 --> 00:32:51,640 do that for him. So as you can imagine, Haman's not super excited, right? And then they come 376 00:32:51,640 --> 00:32:59,160 to the second banquet and Esther actually reveals this plot and, uh, Osuarez, uh, leaves 377 00:32:59,160 --> 00:33:03,200 the leaves the dinner to go walk about. I can't remember exactly why he goes out. I 378 00:33:03,200 --> 00:33:06,320 could actually look in the text, but he steps out and Haman pleads for his life, but it 379 00:33:06,320 --> 00:33:12,480 says that he actually falls on Esther. And then Osuarez comes back in to see Haman all 380 00:33:12,480 --> 00:33:19,960 over Esther and then goes and executes him. Read, read the, read the story, read the queen 381 00:33:19,960 --> 00:33:23,800 you thought you knew. I, it's going to be very difficult for you to see anything else 382 00:33:23,800 --> 00:33:28,440 happening in this text. And the fact that there's a very proud, uh, powerful person 383 00:33:28,440 --> 00:33:35,160 who acts rationally and that there's a, there's a situation being set up here, right now. 384 00:33:35,160 --> 00:33:41,640 And so what, and so Haman is actually deposed. He's, he's, uh, then, uh, executed by Osuarez. 385 00:33:41,640 --> 00:33:46,000 That's actually not where the story ends. And I think a lot of people think that's where 386 00:33:46,000 --> 00:33:51,480 the story ends because then she comes back to him and she's like, Hey, can we not kill 387 00:33:51,480 --> 00:33:59,080 the Jews now? But he's like, I'm not going to, I'm not going to, you can't revoke a decree. 388 00:33:59,080 --> 00:34:05,120 It's a decree that's already gone out. And so what ends up happening is that, that Mordecai 389 00:34:05,120 --> 00:34:10,960 and Esther, they come up with a decree that he's also going to issue that allows the Jews 390 00:34:10,960 --> 00:34:15,040 essentially to defend themselves and to even attack back and take from the other people 391 00:34:15,040 --> 00:34:21,720 if they're aggressed upon. And, uh, so they don't actually reverse the decree. They give 392 00:34:21,720 --> 00:34:26,300 another decree that allows them to act in response to it. It's, it's interesting when 393 00:34:26,300 --> 00:34:30,480 you're looking at this story of Osuarez is that we're like, Oh, we'll just take back 394 00:34:30,480 --> 00:34:35,000 your decree, but that's not how Persians work. And he's also very proud guy. He's a very 395 00:34:35,000 --> 00:34:39,400 stuck on himself. And like, honestly, it probably doesn't matter to him that much that the Jews 396 00:34:39,400 --> 00:34:43,400 would be eliminated. So, I mean, up to this point in history, just in general, admitting 397 00:34:43,400 --> 00:34:49,920 you were wrong, even especially when you're in the place of being like a leader of a country, 398 00:34:49,920 --> 00:34:54,680 of a nation, of an empire, it was something you did not do. Yeah. Right. You actually 399 00:34:54,680 --> 00:35:00,840 see that in Osuarez father to Darius, uh, when, when, when he realized he was wrong 400 00:35:00,840 --> 00:35:05,160 about the decree he made that put Daniel in the lions den, he didn't reverse it. Right. 401 00:35:05,160 --> 00:35:09,020 Right. Because he's like, I can't do that because once I make the decree, it's, it's 402 00:35:09,020 --> 00:35:14,120 set in stone. Like that's a cultural thing that's going on. Not there also in Babylon 403 00:35:14,120 --> 00:35:18,840 also happens in Egypt. Uh, so just around the world, it's actually a common culture 404 00:35:18,840 --> 00:35:22,600 thing at the time. You know, the interesting thing about that is so Darius is deceived 405 00:35:22,600 --> 00:35:27,640 by his trusted advisors. And once again, here we have Haman, the Agagite coming in and giving 406 00:35:27,640 --> 00:35:33,040 a Xerxes Osuarez bad advice that is ultimately not going to be well for his kingdom. There 407 00:35:33,040 --> 00:35:37,320 is this thing that sometimes generationally father to son, son to father, like we start 408 00:35:37,320 --> 00:35:42,600 to see, uh, repeats of the same pattern. Um, we saw that in Genesis with like Abraham to 409 00:35:42,600 --> 00:35:47,040 Isaac, Isaac to Jacob, Jacob to Joseph, right? That there's a lot of like these repeats of 410 00:35:47,040 --> 00:35:53,160 the same character. So, uh, so you start getting into this, this, uh, thing of like, are you 411 00:35:53,160 --> 00:35:56,880 going to learn from the mistakes of your past or are you going to just be doomed or repeat 412 00:35:56,880 --> 00:36:03,040 them? Yeah. I think the invitation is to be different, right? To, to understand your past 413 00:36:03,040 --> 00:36:08,280 so that you can, it can inform your future. Um, one of the things we talk about in churches 414 00:36:08,280 --> 00:36:14,840 is, and I think this is, this has taken on different, um, places depending on your, on 415 00:36:14,840 --> 00:36:18,520 the way that you practice faith, right? But when we talk about generational curses, we're 416 00:36:18,520 --> 00:36:22,700 talking about things that are in people's lives that show up generation to generation 417 00:36:22,700 --> 00:36:28,080 to generation to generation. And, uh, one of the things that, uh, God spoke to me a 418 00:36:28,080 --> 00:36:34,680 few years ago about is that, is that there are, um, there are things in my life, like 419 00:36:34,680 --> 00:36:37,840 my parents were good, right? So I'm on, I want to stress that. Like my parents did a 420 00:36:37,840 --> 00:36:45,080 good job with me, but they weren't perfect. I'm, I'm doing a good job with my son, but 421 00:36:45,080 --> 00:36:49,120 I'm not perfect. So what I try to do is I try to think of the things that I know were 422 00:36:49,120 --> 00:36:55,560 wrong and I try to do them different. Yeah. And I try to do them better for the next generation. 423 00:36:55,560 --> 00:36:59,880 Yeah. And I'll make my own mistakes. I'll make my own, but my hope would be is that 424 00:36:59,880 --> 00:37:05,580 my son then when he has kids is a better father than I was and that his son is a better father 425 00:37:05,580 --> 00:37:10,880 than he is. Right. And in the church, uh, I think a lot of times we have this, this 426 00:37:10,880 --> 00:37:15,040 mentality when we're raising up the generation after us that we're like, Oh, well they don't 427 00:37:15,040 --> 00:37:18,560 know they're not going to be able, I was like, but we want the next generation to be better 428 00:37:18,560 --> 00:37:23,240 than us. Can you imagine if the next generation was better at loving God and loving other 429 00:37:23,240 --> 00:37:28,080 people better at spreading grace and mercy, better at living in truth, but standing in 430 00:37:28,080 --> 00:37:33,640 the middle of the world, right? Right. Better at being generous, better at laying themselves 431 00:37:33,640 --> 00:37:38,360 down on behalf of other people. Yeah. And we did that generation to generation. So like 432 00:37:38,360 --> 00:37:44,400 our kids are, let's just say 14% better than us. Right. And their kids are 20% better than 433 00:37:44,400 --> 00:37:48,440 them. Yeah. And their kids are 25% better than I was like, you know, what do you eventually 434 00:37:48,440 --> 00:37:54,560 get is heaven on earth? Literally because the kingdom of heaven is actually the very 435 00:37:54,560 --> 00:38:00,920 domain that we walk in. Yeah. Absolutely. So there's a few key takeaways, I think from 436 00:38:00,920 --> 00:38:09,040 this passage, one is the danger of being impulsive. It gets him in a lot of trouble, right? Uh, 437 00:38:09,040 --> 00:38:13,880 and not just him, but Darius as well. You saw that some with Darius his life as well. 438 00:38:13,880 --> 00:38:19,780 But this idea of being impulsive of like, I'm just going to make jump, make rash decisions. 439 00:38:19,780 --> 00:38:24,920 It actually ends up getting him to where he in his decrees is actually creating conflicting 440 00:38:24,920 --> 00:38:30,000 decrees. One saying Jews have to be eliminated. He's like, actually, I can't take that away. 441 00:38:30,000 --> 00:38:33,600 But Jews, you can actually defend yourself now. Right. Which by the way, if you have 442 00:38:33,600 --> 00:38:38,480 127 providences that are receiving both those instructions, it's very confusing. Uh huh. 443 00:38:38,480 --> 00:38:45,080 Right. So he's, he's made some decrees that if they went out and people would be like, 444 00:38:45,080 --> 00:38:50,360 something's happening somewhere and I'm not sure what's going on. Yeah. But, uh, and then, 445 00:38:50,360 --> 00:38:56,560 and then it leads people to be like, well, I can legally try to beat that Jew up, but 446 00:38:56,560 --> 00:39:00,720 they can fight back. They can legally fight back. One of the, one of the things that, 447 00:39:00,720 --> 00:39:04,280 uh, is, uh, people have, if you've been on the podcast for a while, you remember the 448 00:39:04,280 --> 00:39:08,880 episode we had with Ed McDowell on here. So I'm going to use him as an example. Um, Ed 449 00:39:08,880 --> 00:39:14,080 McDowell is a very thoughtful person. Uh huh. Um, when you ask questions, he pauses for 450 00:39:14,080 --> 00:39:23,200 a second. Uh huh. And then he answers slowly and like builds his like statement of like, 451 00:39:23,200 --> 00:39:27,920 cause he's not, he's not in a hurry to respond. Yeah. He's not impulsive. Like he's like, 452 00:39:27,920 --> 00:39:32,080 Hey, let me actually think about like how to answer this in terms of like what I actually 453 00:39:32,080 --> 00:39:37,280 think. Yeah. Right. And, uh, there's a lot of, a lot of wisdom in that because when you 454 00:39:37,280 --> 00:39:41,520 have, when you live an impulsive lifestyle, um, you think about the things that he did 455 00:39:41,520 --> 00:39:47,760 impulsively, he, he eliminates fasty impulsively. Right. So now he has a power vacuum at a queen. 456 00:39:47,760 --> 00:39:52,720 So then he has to, uh, go and find a new queen. And then he gets a executive order from our 457 00:39:52,720 --> 00:39:56,920 executive requests from Haman. And he's like, sure, just eliminate these people. I believe 458 00:39:56,920 --> 00:40:04,640 you. Like you need to take a pause and say, okay, Haman, let's talk about that. Can you, 459 00:40:04,640 --> 00:40:09,240 can you give me some examples? And then he realizes that his wife is one of those people 460 00:40:09,240 --> 00:40:14,200 and not, doesn't reverse it, but it's like, okay, well I can't take the other one away, 461 00:40:14,200 --> 00:40:19,840 but your people can now fight back. Yeah. Right. Well, and, and mostly he just says, 462 00:40:19,840 --> 00:40:25,880 you guys can figure that you get, you can issue a decree and I'll stamp it. Yeah. Right. 463 00:40:25,880 --> 00:40:30,280 So Esther and Mordecai actually have to come up with the decree and then he does rubber 464 00:40:30,280 --> 00:40:33,800 stamps it, which by the way is what got him in this, in this situation to begin with. 465 00:40:33,800 --> 00:40:37,760 Right. Like letting other people rubber stamp things for him. Um, now that impulsiveness 466 00:40:37,760 --> 00:40:41,160 I think goes with the second takeaway, which is there is a, there's a ton of consequences 467 00:40:41,160 --> 00:40:47,240 of having pride and power. Yes. Right. Like those two things will cause you to also act 468 00:40:47,240 --> 00:40:51,920 impulsively and, and usually to abuse it. Which by the way, those two things should 469 00:40:51,920 --> 00:40:58,120 never go together. Pride and power. Yeah. Yeah. So, um, like, uh, if you are someone 470 00:40:58,120 --> 00:41:03,520 who is in place of power, you actually need to be living a life of humility because that's 471 00:41:03,520 --> 00:41:07,660 actually going to allow you to be more generous. That's going to allow you to see the brokenness 472 00:41:07,660 --> 00:41:13,480 around you, the hurting around you and be able to take action. Right. When we, when 473 00:41:13,480 --> 00:41:17,060 we live in a place where we're like, look how good I am and you are living in a place 474 00:41:17,060 --> 00:41:21,200 of power, what you, what ends up happening is you end up being like, I am better than 475 00:41:21,200 --> 00:41:27,000 anybody else in this room, anybody else in this town. And guess what? I know it, you 476 00:41:27,000 --> 00:41:31,360 know it. So get over it. And then you end up belittling people and doing the opposite 477 00:41:31,360 --> 00:41:36,120 of what Christ calls us to. Absolutely. I was just thinking that when I edit this for 478 00:41:36,120 --> 00:41:40,760 like a, uh, like a social media clip, I could, I could literally clip you just saying that. 479 00:41:40,760 --> 00:41:45,240 You're like, I'm the best. I'm no, no, no. You're going to do it and send it to a few 480 00:41:45,240 --> 00:41:50,240 people. Yeah. I'll send it to your parents. I'll be like, Hey, just so you know what Spencer 481 00:41:50,240 --> 00:41:54,400 said on the podcast and I will text them and be like, Ben's pulling this out of context. 482 00:41:54,400 --> 00:41:59,960 It's out of context. It'd be a love and out of context. So like, but this idea is, it's 483 00:41:59,960 --> 00:42:04,240 the opposite of being prideful and powerful is the opposite of what Jesus teaches. In 484 00:42:04,240 --> 00:42:07,400 fact, actually what Jesus tells us is that it's actually going to be important for us 485 00:42:07,400 --> 00:42:12,880 to have justice, but also accountability. Yes. Right. So we're not, even when we have 486 00:42:12,880 --> 00:42:18,480 power, we should have accountability. Yeah. Right. Um, I, I'm always hesitant. Like I 487 00:42:18,480 --> 00:42:22,920 think it's completely fine. If a church has a pastor who makes the large bulk of their 488 00:42:22,920 --> 00:42:27,680 decisions, right? It's crazy to me if they don't have a church board, elder board, deacon 489 00:42:27,680 --> 00:42:30,760 board, somebody who's going to come alongside the pastor and be like, Hey, have you thought 490 00:42:30,760 --> 00:42:36,000 about this? Right. Um, even in your case with young life, you have a, you have a committee 491 00:42:36,000 --> 00:42:40,920 who, like if you're like, Hey, I'm thinking about this. What do you think? Right. And 492 00:42:40,920 --> 00:42:47,920 sometimes we go, that's great. And sometimes we're like, well, hold on, maybe this, right. 493 00:42:47,920 --> 00:42:52,720 And, uh, and it's not because, uh, it's not because we think you're going to abuse your 494 00:42:52,720 --> 00:42:56,640 power, but it's, it's to make sure that you, you always are seeing all angles of things 495 00:42:56,640 --> 00:43:00,280 because you're not going to be able to. Right. It's accountability structure. It's accountability 496 00:43:00,280 --> 00:43:06,080 structure, right? Um, because, uh, the, uh, this is the other thing, accountability, uh, 497 00:43:06,080 --> 00:43:11,600 power without accountability, uh, leads to pride. Yeah. And so like, you have to have 498 00:43:11,600 --> 00:43:16,640 that. Uh, and so whenever I'm, you might even say it leads to tyranny. Yeah. Yeah. So you, 499 00:43:16,640 --> 00:43:21,200 you absolutely have to have accountability when you're in your leadership, like, uh, 500 00:43:21,200 --> 00:43:29,760 in leadership roles. Yeah. Um, and then the other one is a call to courage and advocacy. 501 00:43:29,760 --> 00:43:36,000 And this is really more of Esther, but it's in the story of us whereas Esther had a huge 502 00:43:36,000 --> 00:43:42,040 amount of courage to be like, Hey, I'm going to go to the king at the risk of my own life 503 00:43:42,040 --> 00:43:50,520 to see if he will spare my people. Right. Huge amount of courage. Right. Um, and so, 504 00:43:50,520 --> 00:43:56,240 and the other thing is, is what does she have encouraged for? She's having courage for her 505 00:43:56,240 --> 00:44:01,840 people. She's advocating for people that currently don't have a voice and are about to go under 506 00:44:01,840 --> 00:44:09,080 ghosts, massive persecution. Right. Uh, this actually ties over to Matthew 25 where, where 507 00:44:09,080 --> 00:44:15,120 when Jesus is separating out sheep and sheep and the goats, he lists these things and the 508 00:44:15,120 --> 00:44:20,080 sheep are like, yes, we saw he's a sheep. You saw that you acted. The goats are like, 509 00:44:20,080 --> 00:44:23,240 well, when did we see you naked? When did we see you hungry? When did we see you in 510 00:44:23,240 --> 00:44:28,120 prison? And Jesus says, when you did this to the least of these, when you saw the least 511 00:44:28,120 --> 00:44:35,640 of these. Right. And so we have this call as Christians to, to be advocates in our community. 512 00:44:35,640 --> 00:44:39,680 Now I want to preface, we should preface this a little bit though, because sometimes when 513 00:44:39,680 --> 00:44:45,080 people are advocates, they go about it the wrong way. Yeah. Um, advocate advocacy does 514 00:44:45,080 --> 00:44:49,880 not mean that you go around swinging hammers at people. Yes. That is, that's actually a 515 00:44:49,880 --> 00:44:55,360 construction work. That's a completely different field. If you have anger management issues, 516 00:44:55,360 --> 00:45:00,680 demo work with a sledgehammer is great. Yep. Um, but, uh, yeah, it's, it doesn't mean that 517 00:45:00,680 --> 00:45:05,600 you, cause a lot of times we can become advocates at the belittlement of other people who are 518 00:45:05,600 --> 00:45:10,360 also need to be advocated for. Yeah. One, one little piece I want to throw in here. 519 00:45:10,360 --> 00:45:13,400 We weren't spending a lot of time talking about Esther, but I think it's, it's important 520 00:45:13,400 --> 00:45:18,400 when we're talking about this advocacy role, um, in the, when Mordecai comes to Esther, 521 00:45:18,400 --> 00:45:21,960 he makes a bunch of different statements. Uh, and, and, and I'm not going to get into 522 00:45:21,960 --> 00:45:25,600 it because it's in the book and it's also in some teachings by Rabbi David Foreman, 523 00:45:25,600 --> 00:45:29,520 but there is a contextual link to a story in the book of numbers. I believe it's the 524 00:45:29,520 --> 00:45:32,960 book of numbers. I might be misquoting the book, but it's the story of when a husband 525 00:45:32,960 --> 00:45:39,720 is able to, um, override a wife's vow. Right. And I think we talked about this briefly when 526 00:45:39,720 --> 00:45:45,600 we were in Torah. Um, but essentially the conversation that Mordecai has coming in with 527 00:45:45,600 --> 00:45:52,440 Esther is he says, uh, he quotes from this, this chapter because there's not three choices. 528 00:45:52,440 --> 00:45:59,300 There's not, you can speak up, say nothing or, or, um, silently align that if you silently 529 00:45:59,300 --> 00:46:04,720 align, you're essentially saying that what they're doing is okay. Yeah. Okay. Um, being 530 00:46:04,720 --> 00:46:11,640 quiet is not a third choice. It's choosing to align yourself with what they're doing. 531 00:46:11,640 --> 00:46:16,100 And that doesn't mean that you're going to, uh, like we were saying, take a hammer and 532 00:46:16,100 --> 00:46:19,600 start throwing it at people. But if you don't speak up and you don't make a statement about 533 00:46:19,600 --> 00:46:23,920 injustice, you don't make it, you don't do something with your life to stand against 534 00:46:23,920 --> 00:46:29,720 it. Then essentially you're saying the injustice is okay. It's, it's not, there is no third 535 00:46:29,720 --> 00:46:34,240 choice you either for the injustice or you're against the injustice. And I'm not what, like 536 00:46:34,240 --> 00:46:41,480 to your point is that advocacy doesn't mean that you start, you know, throwing fists, 537 00:46:41,480 --> 00:46:46,560 right? You don't, you don't put out a fire by starting a fire in another location. Correct. 538 00:46:46,560 --> 00:46:52,960 Right. But if you also are just like, this is fine or I'm just not going to say anything 539 00:46:52,960 --> 00:46:59,160 about a fire. So if I'm driving down the road and I see a house on fire and I don't call 540 00:46:59,160 --> 00:47:05,320 911, my choice was not to be silent and that I was not in favor of the fire. It means that 541 00:47:05,320 --> 00:47:10,300 I was, I was, I was taking an active role in not suppressing the fire. I had an option 542 00:47:10,300 --> 00:47:14,080 to stand up and to do what was right. And I chose not to. 543 00:47:14,080 --> 00:47:18,440 So I have a friend, he describes advocacy this way where he's like a lot of times when 544 00:47:18,440 --> 00:47:22,880 we are being advocates, we'll see a fire in one spot and then we'll go start a fire somewhere 545 00:47:22,880 --> 00:47:29,960 else. And it'll be like, but look how much worse that fire is. Right. And, and, and to 546 00:47:29,960 --> 00:47:36,760 that he's like, what good did you just do? Now you have two fires. Yeah. Not one. Right. 547 00:47:36,760 --> 00:47:41,080 Like if you want to put a fire out, you need to have a, you need to have something that 548 00:47:41,080 --> 00:47:45,640 puts fire out. You need to have, you need to have some water or some dirt or something 549 00:47:45,640 --> 00:47:51,680 like that to where you can be like, okay, here is an issue. Here's a problem. How can 550 00:47:51,680 --> 00:47:57,000 we come alongside and help address this? Right. Because if you're going to be an advocate, 551 00:47:57,000 --> 00:48:01,800 you need to be part of the solution. Right. Uh, if you're going to try to be an advocate 552 00:48:01,800 --> 00:48:06,920 and make, make someone else part of the solution, that's not going to work. Right. Which incidentally 553 00:48:06,920 --> 00:48:11,920 that's exactly what also ours does. Uh huh. Right. And, uh, and his, his rain doesn't 554 00:48:11,920 --> 00:48:14,880 last very long. I don't remember if you guys heard me at the beginning, uh, his rain, we're 555 00:48:14,880 --> 00:48:20,760 only talking about 30 years. Uh, that's pretty, that's pretty low amount of years for somebody 556 00:48:20,760 --> 00:48:25,400 in a, in that kind of position. Yeah. A lifetime appointment. Yeah. Lifetime appointment. Like 557 00:48:25,400 --> 00:48:29,000 it's a, it's a pretty short term. Yeah. But another way to think of advocacy real quick 558 00:48:29,000 --> 00:48:39,880 is if I, let's say my car broke down and I went to Ben and said, you need to fix my car. 559 00:48:39,880 --> 00:48:43,920 First of all, it would never get fixed. No, it would not. I would be like, are these tires? 560 00:48:43,920 --> 00:48:46,240 You're like, that's definitely a steering wheel. Nick is going to listen to this and 561 00:48:46,240 --> 00:48:49,900 he's going to be like, why would you ask Ben? Yeah. He's like, why would you ask Ben to 562 00:48:49,900 --> 00:48:57,200 fix your car? Uh, uh, right. Versus I could actually go to a shop and advocate for my 563 00:48:57,200 --> 00:49:02,440 car to be fixed. Yeah. Right. It's might cost me some time. Might cost me some money. Right. 564 00:49:02,440 --> 00:49:06,880 But if I, if I just went to Ben and I was picking on Ben because Ben and I both know 565 00:49:06,880 --> 00:49:12,280 he doesn't know much about cars. Uh, side note, Thanksgiving dinner, uh, we, uh, there's 566 00:49:12,280 --> 00:49:16,160 another friend there and him and I were both talking cars and Ben's over there. He's like 567 00:49:16,160 --> 00:49:25,320 engines, wheels. Yeah. I was like oil change timing belt. I just started saying random 568 00:49:25,320 --> 00:49:28,120 random things that were like, that has nothing to do with what we're talking about, but you 569 00:49:28,120 --> 00:49:33,040 know, um, so, but right, right. If you're going to advocate for someone, you need to 570 00:49:33,040 --> 00:49:40,140 actually go to a source to where that's avocation is going to be successful. Yeah. It's interesting. 571 00:49:40,140 --> 00:49:43,800 So when you have the, the life of us, whereas like that is a complete opposite of who he 572 00:49:43,800 --> 00:49:48,440 was like, so he's about accumulation of power and about authority and about pride and all 573 00:49:48,440 --> 00:49:52,560 these different things that, uh, he has money, his wealth, his status has kind of given him 574 00:49:52,560 --> 00:49:56,640 and he actually stopped like in some ways, Darius was better about this, but he was an 575 00:49:56,640 --> 00:50:00,160 advocate of actually bringing people together. Yeah. Right. About actually finding ways to 576 00:50:00,160 --> 00:50:04,800 work together. Um, I don't like a lot of his stuff ended out poorly, but like that, that 577 00:50:04,800 --> 00:50:08,880 was the goal in what he was trying to do. Um, whereas Asuara is almost, almost every 578 00:50:08,880 --> 00:50:14,840 decision he keeps making does more to divide people. Yep. Right. Um, he kills off Vashti, 579 00:50:14,840 --> 00:50:20,360 who's likely a political, you know, ally. Um, he marries, uh, Esther, who's an unknown, 580 00:50:20,360 --> 00:50:25,800 right. And then he elevates Hainan, Haman, who wants to eradicate an entire people. Like 581 00:50:25,800 --> 00:50:30,600 he's not actually advocating for the people under his rule. He's just kind of going with 582 00:50:30,600 --> 00:50:33,600 the path of the resistance and what's going to bring the most power for himself. That's 583 00:50:33,600 --> 00:50:38,760 definitely not what you want in advocacy. Right. And so there, there's this, this idea 584 00:50:38,760 --> 00:50:43,400 that we have to, we have to be careful. Uh, the Asuara sees us a lot about not being impatient 585 00:50:43,400 --> 00:50:48,960 about, about learning how to walk in humility, not to let pride and power control us, but 586 00:50:48,960 --> 00:50:52,960 how to advocate for those and pursue justice for people around the world, but to do it 587 00:50:52,960 --> 00:50:59,600 in such a way that we bring kingdom to earth, not our perspective. Yeah. Asuara is, is a 588 00:50:59,600 --> 00:51:05,240 great example of what not to do. Yeah. If you want to live those three things out. Yeah. 589 00:51:05,240 --> 00:51:08,240 There are figures in history that teach you what to do because of the good things that 590 00:51:08,240 --> 00:51:11,800 they do. And there are other figures that teach you what to do because you're like, 591 00:51:11,800 --> 00:51:17,800 well, don't do that. So we're both, both you and I are, uh, we have older siblings, right? 592 00:51:17,800 --> 00:51:21,920 I can much older in my case, my brother's not gonna listen to this. I don't want to 593 00:51:21,920 --> 00:51:28,560 say it anyways. Uh, uh, but in, uh, I'm sure in your case, my case though, like I had the 594 00:51:28,560 --> 00:51:33,280 opportunity to look at how my siblings behaved and see the consequences they got from my 595 00:51:33,280 --> 00:51:38,400 parents and to kind of weigh out in my head, like, Oh, that might not be a good idea or 596 00:51:38,400 --> 00:51:42,080 Oh, they got praise for that. That's probably is a good idea. Now that I follow through 597 00:51:42,080 --> 00:51:45,360 with that, that's another question. I was just saying, I got away with everything according 598 00:51:45,360 --> 00:51:52,640 to them because I was the baby. Yeah. So, um, so point being is we can do that with 599 00:51:52,640 --> 00:51:57,120 history too. You can look at people and be like, wow, they did everything wrong. And 600 00:51:57,120 --> 00:52:02,320 it's like, good note that don't do that. Right. You can look at people and be like, man, they 601 00:52:02,320 --> 00:52:08,800 did a lot of good. Okay. Note that maybe follow their example. So yeah. Why was it good? Why 602 00:52:08,800 --> 00:52:14,320 was it bad? How did those apply to our modern context? That's what it happens with reading 603 00:52:14,320 --> 00:52:17,680 literature in its context. It helps you actually understand like, what does this actually have 604 00:52:17,680 --> 00:52:23,320 for me? Like in my context. So, um, that's going to be Kings and kingdoms. King also 605 00:52:23,320 --> 00:52:29,680 our is we only butchered it like 80,000 shoes. Our shoes are us. I really, why is it? So 606 00:52:29,680 --> 00:52:33,840 I don't, it comes out as an accent every time. Uh, we got two more episodes that are going 607 00:52:33,840 --> 00:52:41,480 to be coming up. Uh, we're going to be talking about Herod the great misleading, uh, and 608 00:52:41,480 --> 00:52:46,520 Caesar Augustus. Yeah. What I'm going to tell you about Herod the great is that any person 609 00:52:46,520 --> 00:52:51,520 who puts the great at the end of their name usually wasn't that great. So, uh, we also 610 00:52:51,520 --> 00:52:55,920 will tell you about Spencer the great. No, just kidding. I want you to know I did not 611 00:52:55,920 --> 00:53:02,360 put that at the end of my name. Yeah. All right. Until next time. And that's a wrap 612 00:53:02,360 --> 00:53:06,760 for today's episode of love and context. We hope you enjoyed this engaging conversation 613 00:53:06,760 --> 00:53:11,040 and gain valuable insights into the powerful message of love within the Bible. We'd love 614 00:53:11,040 --> 00:53:15,800 to hear from you and continue the conversation. Connect with us by sending us your questions, 615 00:53:15,800 --> 00:53:22,480 thoughts, and suggestions to love and context at gmail.com. We greatly appreciate your feedback 616 00:53:22,480 --> 00:53:27,600 and ideas for future episodes. Stay connected with us on social media for updates, behind 617 00:53:27,600 --> 00:53:32,720 the scenes content and additional resources. You can find us on Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, 618 00:53:32,720 --> 00:53:36,760 and Facebook at love and context. Don't forget to hit that follow button to stay up to date 619 00:53:36,760 --> 00:53:41,040 with the latest episodes and join our growing community. Thank you for being part of the 620 00:53:41,040 --> 00:53:46,320 love and context family. Remember love is at the heart of it all until next time. Keep 621 00:53:46,320 --> 00:53:52,640 seeking wisdom, embracing love and living out your faith in the context of today's world.