I sat at a table with seven kindergarteners staring back at me, waiting for me to say something. A student had asked me to tell the story of Purim while they ate their snack. That day at Hebrew School, we had discussed the themes of Purim, but hadn’t yet gone over the full megillah.
For a few seconds, I paused. Where to start? What was okay to leave in—or to leave out? Would this become a core memory for these young children? Would they reflect on it for years to come, long after I have forgotten their names and they have forgotten mine?
Stories are powerful in that way. They always have a human voice, yet they last through generations as they are passed down. The way we tell stories matters because they can change how we see the world or open our eyes to new ideas.
Every year since I was about my students’ age, I have listened to the reading of the megillah at synagogue. But I realized in that moment that I had never told the story in my own words before. And that was a little bit scary.
I decided to begin with Queen Vashti.
From a young age, I looked up to Vashti every time I listened to her section in the megillah—even though I knew we were supposed to admire Esther. I realized it was because I hoped to gain her confidence, which might make it easier for me to speak up for myself. When I was younger, I often went along with what others wanted in order to make them happy. Sometimes I still struggle with this, but now I know staying quiet lets people take advantage of you.
I emphasized how Vashti’s decision to stand up to the king was one of bravery and strength. I told them that she didn’t do anything wrong by putting herself first.
I wanted my students to hear that it is important to stand up for themselves and that they could say “no” to things they didn’t want to do. I remember wishing someone had told me that when I was in kindergarten.
Vashti knew the rules when she broke them. She most likely understood that defying the king’s orders would lead to her exile or death. Yet she still had the confidence to stand up for herself.
Centering Vashti in my version of the Purim story, instead of centering Esther, felt like breaking a rule myself. I was breaking the rules of the traditional story to talk about the rulebreaker.
Women are often portrayed as passive rule followers in stories and history, which is why they are vilified when they ultimately break the rules. However, history has shown time and time again that not all rules are meant to be followed.
This semester at UNC Chapel Hill, I am studying Jewish women in the United States. Historians only know a few of the names of the first Jewish women who arrived in America in the mid-17th century. However, countless more women never had their names recorded as they made the journey to the New World.
As we have progressed through American history over the past few weeks of the semester, I have noticed how this theme has reappeared. In 1895, Rosa Sonneschein, the founder and editor of The American Jewess magazine, published an article addressing the absence of women’s names. She had read through a list of 20,000 names from 102 synagogues and noticed that not one listed “Mrs” before a member’s name. Married couples were both listed under the husband’s name.
This deeply frustrated Sonneschein. She couldn’t understand why congregations were unable to include the names of the women who attended their services. She furiously asked, “Which will be the first [congregation] to record our names?” Clearly she felt it was long past time for women to be recognized as their own person.
Sonneschein was especially offended because the “official history” of the congregation purposefully excluded these women, even though they performed important synagogue activities. They were essential to the story, but they weren’t full characters. Like Queen Vashti, Sonneschein challenged a rule that she found unjust, and was prepared to face the consequences.
The traditional Purim story—the “official history”—leaves out the nuance of Queen Vashti’s complicated feelings. It reduces her simply to a plot device, rather than a full character. She was probably scared to make the decision that she did, but she felt like it was the right thing to do. Even though the story leaves her emotions unsaid, I can imagine how she might have felt, because I feel it too when I know I need to stand up for myself or break an established rule.
Sonneschein wanted synagogues to break a rule that she believed was arbitrary and disrespectful. After all, Jewish women and men sang the same prayers to the same God in the same synagogue building. Yet they were not recorded as equal members of the congregation. Through her determined dedication to this cause in the late 19th century, women were able to gain more freedom within their synagogues, finally becoming equal members with the ability to vote and be elected to synagogue boards.
Rules are constantly changing, and often must change to ensure a fairer society. By sharing a deeper and more nuanced version of the Purim story, I hoped to remind these seven kindergarteners that they come from a long Jewish tradition of women breaking rules. And maybe one day, when they need to stand up for themselves or question an unjust rule, they will derive their confidence from this version of the Purim story.
