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at The 92nd Street Y, New York. Supported by The Elie Wiesel Foundation for Humanity
Oct 29, 1981
Professor Wiesel’s foremost question is why God “chose not to give His name to the Book of Esther?” On the first level the story seems “marvelously simple,” an “awe-inspiring fairy tale which manages to reassure the child in each of us.” And this view “explains the universal popularity of Purim . . . that will last as long as exile, and longer.” But Professor Wiesel goes deeper, realizing that “in my time, the Jews of Shushan were not spared.” The Midrash sees each figure in the story as “more human and more profound.” But the vengeful ending points to why God refrains from being included therein:” to be Jewish, for God, and for the Jewish tradition, is to have all the reasons in the world to seek vengeance . . . but to choose not to.”
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