Two Queens Proclaim a Fast

These two queens were worlds apart, and the fasts they proclaimed were diametrically opposite in attitude and purpose.

Growing up, I never remember having heard the word fasting. Not, that is, until as a young teenager, my family began observing the Day of Atonement along with the other holy days listed in Leviticus 23. When a relative found out what we were doing, going without food or drink from sundown to sundown, she exclaimed, “But people will die if they don’t eat or drink!”

Years later, members of the Church of God have survived many fasts, and fasting is now of enough general interest that a quick check on Amazon will turn up over 2,000 related titles, most of which fall into two broad categories: physical and spiritual.

Not complicated

On the face of it, fasting is not a complicated concept: doing without some or all food, drink or both for a period of time. So physically speaking, it amounts to having willpower and self-discipline to achieve goals related to health and weight loss. (Of course, this should be done in a balanced way; those with medical conditions should consult a professional.)

Spiritually, though, this seemingly simple act is as complex as the secret workings of the human heart. Isaiah 58 includes a particular challenge for appropriate fasting in God’s eyes: Will it be for strife and debate or to smite with the fist of wickedness (verse 4)? Or will it be to loose the bonds of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens and to let the oppressed go free (verse 6)? (For the entire context regarding fasting, read verses 3-7.)

Worlds apart

These opposing motivations are clearly seen at work when comparing the lives of two ancient queens, Jezebel and Esther. While they have a couple of things in common—both were queens and both knew how to function within the intricacies of royal protocol—in matters of the heart, these two consorts were worlds apart.

One wields the power

One verse, 1 Kings 16:31, sets the stage for unspeakable trouble for the kingdom of Israel and introduces a queen who would know no bounds: “And it came to pass, as though it had been a trivial thing for him [King Ahab] to walk in the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, that he took as wife Jezebel the daughter of Ethbaal, king of the Sidonians; and he went and served Baal and worshiped him.”

Jezebel was “an imperious, unscrupulous, vindictive, determined, devilish woman, a demon incarnate” (Henry Halley, Pocket Bible Handbook, 19th edition, p. 183). She was willing to use any means to achieve her ends. That included ordering the wholesale execution of the prophets of the Lord (1 Kings 18:4, 13) and using fasting as a tactic to aid in sating her husband’s greed (21:9).

Conspiracy afoot

King Ahab was depressed, and rightfully so. God had just told him he would pay with his life for all the wickedness that he had done (20:42-43). And now Naboth the Jezreelite refused to sell Ahab his vineyard—a perfect place for a royal herb garden. Ahab sulked and refused to eat. So Jezebel crafted a plan.

She wrote letters to all the elders and nobles in her husband’s name, proclaiming a fast, and then proceeded to bring Naboth to trial on fabricated charges. False witnesses, “sons of Belial,” testified that the vineyard owner had not only blasphemed God but the king as well. Punishment was swift. Naboth was summarily executed, and the king got what he wanted.

Fasting, an action intended to importune God’s mercy and redress, was despicably used “to strike with the fist of wickedness.” (The entire account of Ahab and Jezebel is found between 1 Kings 18 and 2 Kings 10.)

The fairest in the land

More than 400 years later, another king, Ahasuerus (Xerxes) of Persia, was looking for a new wife. His current wife Vashti had defied his orders, so she was banished (some say, killed), and the search was on for a replacement—the fairest virgin in the land.

Among those brought to the palace in Shushan for consideration was the beautiful Hadassah—Esther—the young orphaned charge of Mordecai, her Jewish cousin, who held an office in the king’s court.

You’ll remember the events that followed: Mordecai advising his cousin to keep her Jewish heritage secret; Esther’s being chosen to replace the rebellious Queen Vashti; and the ominous scheming of the ever-ambitious and imperious Haman to eradicate the Jews and promote himself.

One humbles herself

Haman, with permission from the unsuspecting king, sent an edict throughout the empire: Kill all Jews, both young and old, little children and women, on one day (Esther 3:13), under the pretext that “their laws are different from all other people’s and they do not keep the king’s laws” (verse 8).

Mordecai was distraught. The Jews were distraught. But Esther, the queen, a Jewess, knew what she had to do. The fate of a people was at stake.

She told Mordecai to “go, gather all the Jews who are present in Shushan, and fast for me; neither eat nor drink for three days, night or day. My maids and I will fast likewise. And so I will go to the king, which is against the law; and if I perish, I perish!” (Esther 4:16).

A happy ending

This was truly a fast “to loose the bonds of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, to let the oppressed go free.” And as a result—well, you can read the amazing rest of the story and its happy ending in Esther 5 through 10.

For more information

If you would like to know about another Bible personality’s attitude when fasting, read Daniel’s prayer for the people in Daniel 9:1-18.

For more about fasting, see “What Is Fasting?”

For more information on the holy days of God, read the informative booklet From Holidays to Holy Days: God’s Plan for You.

Karen Meeker was surprised and encouraged to read that while Jezebel was wicked to the core and died a fitting death, her equally culpable husband actually came to the place of humbling himself before God with fasting and he was granted mercy. Read it for yourself in 1 Kings 21:25-29.