Biblion Bible Commentary
Read the introduction to Esther · About this commentary
Gallows Fifty Cubits High
Esther 5:9-14
9 Then Haman went out that day joyful and glad of heart, but when Haman saw Mordecai in the king’s gate, that he didn’t stand up nor move for him, he was filled with wrath against Mordecai. · WEB
Haman inventories everything he has and finds it worthless, and the object he builds to fix that is the one he will die on.
He leaves the banquet joyful and glad of heart, and the mood lasts until he sees one man not standing up.
Verse 10 records something that will not last either: Haman restrained himself. He goes home instead, and what happens at home is the chapter's real subject.
Verses 11 and 12 are an inventory recited aloud to an audience of friends and a wife: the glory of his riches, the multitude of his children, his promotions, his elevation above the other princes — and then the freshest item, that the queen invited him alone with the king, and tomorrow I am also invited by her.
Every single thing on that list is true. He has all of it.
Then verse 13, and it is the most psychologically exact sentence in the book: yet all this avails me nothing, so long as I see Mordecai the Jew sitting at the king's gate. Everything he possesses is canceled by one man's posture. The book does not moralize; it simply lets the arithmetic stand — total wealth, minus one unbowed head, equals nothing.
The remedy proposed by his wife and friends is proportionate to that arithmetic rather than to the offense: a gallows fifty cubits high, which is far taller than any execution requires. It is built to be seen from a distance.
And verse 14 ends with this pleased Haman, so he had the gallows made. He builds it that night. Two chapters later he hangs on it, and the book records that the structure was already standing at his own house when the king asked for it Esther 7:9.
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