THEMES of Featured Mystical Classics Articles

Three days and nights contain seventy-two hours, corresponding to the exalted 72-letter Name of G-d. In the power of this Name, G-d split the Red sea, He guided them in His protection and they had no fear of the enemy. Esther approached G-d in her prayers with the power of her seventy-two-hour fast, sure of His help with the power of that Name.

Jacob bowed before Esau seven times; although did no wrong as he was bowing down to the Shechinah, he was nonetheless guilty of giving a false impression to his family, causing them to think that he was bowing down to Esau.

Mordechai was the reincarnation of Jacob and Haman the reincarnation of Esau. Mordechai came and repaired Jacob's misstep by refusing to bow down to Haman.

The Talmud teaches that G-d indicated to Moses that the reading of the Megillah would be continued also in the future. Although the Jewish people's sinfulness while in exile causes them to neglect the observance of the Festivals, nonetheless the days of Purim will not suffer such neglect.

"Mordechai would not kneel and would not bow to Haman…"

Jacob and his family bowed down to Esau as a symbol of submission and deference; his limp was a sign a of his frailty in the face of Esau’s power. But the unborn Benjamin was not part of the bowing procession.

Benjamin’s absence would blossom into Mordechai – Benjamin’s descendant – refusing to bow to Esau’s descendant, Haman, thus rectifying the concession that took place twelve centuries earler.

Man was never supposed to die; death entered the world when Adam and Eve ate from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. Fine wine, which develops greater texture and taste with age, hint to G-d's initial desire of the possibility of man's unlimited growth and improvement in this world.