The Additions to Esther are not Scriptural

The Septuagintal text clashes with the canon

If you read the Book of Esther in the Septuagint rather than the Masoretic Text, you will notice that there are several extra chapters in the LXX: chapters 11-16, known as the Additions to Esther.

Nicholas of Lyra said of these chapters:

“The rest which comes after I do not intend to explain, because it is not in the Hebrew, nor belongs to the canonical scripture, but rather seems to have been invented by Josephus and other writers, and afterwards inserted in the vulgar edition.”

There are reasons why we ought to come to the same conclusion.

In the Additions to Esther (AoE) 11:2, we read:

In the second year, when Artaxerxes[a], (that is, Xerxes, or Ahasuerus) the most reigned/the mightiest king reigned, Mordecai, the son of Jair, the son of Shimei, the son of Kish, of the lineage of Benjamin, saw a dream in the first day of the month Nisan, that is, June; [The second year, reigning Artaxerxes* the most, the first day of the month Nisan, Mordecai, the son of Jair, son of Shimei, son of Kish, of the lineage of Benjamin,]

Meanwhile, in the traditional text, in Esther 2:16 — as William Whitaker (A Disputation on Holy Scripture) points out — we read that these events occurred in the seventh year of his reign:

So Esther was taken unto king Ahasuerus into his house royal in the tenth month, which is the month Tebeth, in the seventh year of his reign

Of course, these both cannot be true. (This article is heavily indebted to Whitaker’s Disputation, which is free to read on Monergism).

AoE 11:12 states:

And when Mordecai in his sleep had seen this thing, and had risen from his bed, he thought, what God would do, and he had fast set in his soul this vision, and coveted to know, what the dream signified. [The which thing when Mordecai had seen, and risen of the bed, he thought, what God would do, and fixed he had in the inwit, coveting to know, what the sweven should betoken.]

Thus there was a five year discrepancy between the action of the apocryphal and the canonical books of Esther, which are impossible to reconcile.

The Additions to Esther become more odd when we consider the introduction in 11:1, where we read:

In the fourth year, when Ptolemy and Cleopatra reigned, Dositheus, that said himself to be a priest and of the kin of Levi, and Ptolemy, his son, brought this epistle of lots into Jerusalem, which epistle they said, that Lysimachus, the son of Ptolemy, translated. This is a rubric; for this beginning was in the common translation, which beginning is not told in Hebrew, neither at any of the translators. [The fourth year, reigning Ptolemy and Cleopatra, Dositheus, that a priest and of Levi kindred said himself to be, and Ptolemy, his son, brought this epistle of Purim, the which they said, Lysimachus, the son of Ptolemy, in Jerusalem to have interpreted. This forsooth was the beginning in the common translation, that neither in Hebrew, nor with any of the interpreters is told.

This is very much out of time with the events of the book of Esther themselves, which took place in the 5th century B.C., compared to the reign of Ptolemy and Cleopatra: brother and sister who reigned in Egypt as co-heirs from around 51 B.C. — placing the delivery of this letter to about the year 48 B.C.

Whitaker provides other reasons, such as the reward given to Mordecai in Additions to Esther 12:5:

And the king commanded Mordecai, that he should dwell in the hall of the palace, and he gave to him gifts for the telling.

Which is not given to Mordecai in canonical Esther 6:3:

And the king said, What honour and dignity hath been done to Mordecai for this? Then said the king's servants that ministered unto him, There is nothing done for him.

The reaction of the king is fierce in the Additions to Esther 15:7:

And when he had raised up his face, and had showed the madness, or austereness, of his heart with burning eyes, the queen felled down before him; and when her colour was changed into paleness, she rested her head bowed down upon her handmaid. [And when he had reared up the face, and with burning eyes the madness of the breast had showed, the queen fell down; and the colour changed into paleness, the weary head upon the handmaid she bowed down.]

Yet in canonical Esther, the queen obtained favor from the king (Esther 5:2):

And it was so, when the king saw Esther the queen standing in the court, that she obtained favour in his sight: and the king held out to Esther the golden sceptre that was in his hand. So Esther drew near, and touched the top of the sceptre.

The Septuagint’s Haman is a Macedonian (Additions to Esther 16:10):

And that ye understand more openly that thing, that we say; Haman the son of Hammedatha, a man of Macedonia by soul and folk, and an alien from the blood of Persians, and defouling our piety with his cruelty, was a pilgrim, or a stranger, and was received of (or by) us; [And that ye more openly understand that we have said; Haman, the son of Hammedatha, will and kindred of Macedonia, and alien from the blood of Persians, and our piety with his cruelty defouling, a pilgrim is taken of us;]

Whereas the canonical Haman is an Agagite (Esther 3:1):

After these things did king Ahasuerus promote Haman the son of Hammedatha the Agagite, and advanced him, and set his seat above all the princes that were with him.

Obviously, these two are at odds: Haman’s Agagite blood feud with the Israelites being a central theme of the traditional text that the apocryphal version spoils and contradicts.

Moreover, the Septuagintal Apocrypha then uses Haman’s conjectured Macedonian nationality to propose a plot by Haman to switch the rule of the Persians to that of the Macedonian nation.

William Whitaker explains why this view is ridiculous:

Seventhly, Haman is not only said (chapter 16.) to have been a Macedonian himself, but also to have designed, after removing Mordecai and Esther, to lay violent hands upon the king, in order to transfer the kingdom of the Persians to the Macedonians. But, first, how could Haman have transferred the kingdom of the Persians to the Macedonians, if he had succeeded ever so well in putting the king to death? For the kingdom of the Macedonians was at that time little or nothing.

Besides, the true history contains not a trace of the story told in chapter 16., that he plotted against Mordecai and Esther, in order that, by their destruction, he might the more easily attack the king, and transfer the kingdom to the Macedonians. For he was not aware that the queen was a Jewess, or related to Mordecai; and he devised all sorts of mischief against Mordecai, not to open himself a way to the kingdom, but simply to satisfy his malice. For Mordecai was not, in the beginning, when Haman first conceived this grudge against him, in any station of authority, so as in any way to eclipse his splendor.

But if any one choose to say that Mordecai’s information was the means of saving the king from assassination, and that thus an obstacle was set in the way of Haman’s ambition, and it was this which kindled such a blaze of hatred; he must be given to understand that he contradicts the sacred narrative. For that conspiracy of the eunuchs and the information of Mordecai took place before Haman had acquired so much favor and power in the royal court, as is manifest from the second chapter and the beginning of the third.

Reading the canonical and Septuagintal Esther will — at best — leave one feeling rather confused. The Protestant church has traditionally rejected the Additions to Esther for good reason, and I believe we should continue to do so.