Chapter I: Esther Loved by Mordecai

'A clear reminiscence' of the time when Esther was the goddess bride of Mordecai (her cousin) appears in modern Jewish plays in which Mordecai is the lover (I hope merely platonic) of Esther.[12] And a very natural modern touch it is. The pair were cousins, and Esther was extremely pretty. In exactly the same way two little girls of my acquaintance dramatised 'Bluebeard,' and made the _brother_ (who rescues Mrs. Bluebeard in the tale) the _lover_ of Mrs. Bluebeard. She had preferred to marry Bluebeard for his money, on which, in this most immoral drama, Mrs. Bluebeard and her lover, her husband's slayer, lived happily ever afterwards. This is modern! The original tale does not run thus.

Again, Mr. Frazer says that the Babbis maintain that Xerxes only wedded a shadow Esther, 'while the real Esther sat on the lap of Mordecai.' A most natural shift to save Esther's character in a case of mixed marriages. So Stesichorus and Euripides, long before, gave a shadow Helen into the arms of Paris. The real Helen, meanwhile, saved her character by leading a life of remarkable purity in Egypt. These late shifts and evasions have no real bearing on the question of the original relations between Esther and Mordecai.