No Small Parts - Vashti
July 26, 2020 Sunday Evening Study

Most of you know about about my last IT job with the state of Colorado. As far as IT jobs in the area where I worked, it was about as good a job as you can get without stepping into executive management, which was not something I was terribly interested in doing. I got to actually change the way things were done at the state, and it had a direct impact on citizens, including myself. 

My job was to manage service management. What that means is that we controlled processes. It sounds redundant, but think of it this way. You have an IT department made up of specialists. This guy specializes in hardware, this person in software, this person in networks, this person in security, etc. With computer systems, there are a lot of dependencies - we can’t work on software programming if the network is down - things like that. Basically, my team served as the glue that held all of the other teams together through communication. We managed the process for when changes were made so that they could be done with as little impact as possible. When there was an outage, my team would lead the effort to restore service, getting the teams to work together until things were back up, and then we would lead the investigation into what went wrong in the first place. 

The state was not my first job providing this function in IT. I had done it for a bank, like I discussed last week, a pharmaceutical company, and a health care network as well. In fact the health care job, the one that moved us from AZ to CO is actually what I want to discuss today. Briefly though, if you don’t know how I lost my state job, it was a political maneuver. I had a peer - another senior manager in my department with whom I was required to work closely. He was threatened by me, as my team was pretty notorious throughout the organization, and I had a lot of goodwill built up. He and I got along on the surface, but there was a dynamic of inferiority. I had experience in what he did, and he had no experience in what I did, so he lived in fear of losing his job to me. Indeed he almost did on several occasions. 

Here is the thing about this peer - he was openly gay. As it happens, when we were peers, he got married and invited me to his wedding. I told him that I wished him the best of luck and was happy that he was happy, but that due to my faith I would not be able to attend.

A few months later there was a massive reorganization at work. Our boss, also gay, placed my peer in authority over me. On my first day reporting to him, I was let go, to the shock of everyone in the organization.

My health care job was basically doing the same thing, only in a much more fast-paced environment for much higher stakes. You can imagine the stress of trying to restore an outage where the local DMV can’t process peoples’ registration and there are droves of angry citizens. Imagine that outage being a system in a hospital, and you know that for every 20 minutes or so you are working on an issue, someone dies. This was what life was like at that job, and was largely the reason I only lasted 6 months under that pressure. However, that wasn’t even the biggest problem there.

I had a unique experience. This company outsourced their IT to an Indian company. I actually worked for the Indian company as a contractor for the health care company - our client. My job involved giving an accurate report of system health and stability to our client so that they could properly plan upgrades, changes, and other events. 

As is often the norm with outsourced IT, my company was not particularly good at what they did. The place was a total revolving door from the top down as they did not know how to take care of their employees - especially the Indian ones. In six months I had 9 different bosses.

One of these bosses did not like the way our numbers looked, because, again, our company was not good at what we did. My time was mostly consumed with managing outages that were caused by very easily prevented mistakes, and our numbers reflected that. As I was responsible for generating all of the reports and leading the meetings with the client, my boss decided she wanted to make things look better than they were. I was told on multiple occasions to not report on bad stuff, and to put duplicate reports of positive numbers in my presentations to the client. This was the first time in my life I had to tell a boss that I refused to do what she was instructing me to do - but right is right. In this case, she was found out and was summarily fired. So when I stood up for the integrity of my job I was spared, yet when I stood up for the integrity of my faith, I was let go.

The Bible is full of stories of people who stood against opposition and would not do the wrong things they were told to do. Shadrach, Meeshak, and Abednigo, Daniel, the prophets, Uriah, as we discussed a few weeks ago. This is something we are all called to do as Christians.

Many of you know the story of Esther. However, in Christian churches, there is one character that is largely glossed over - Vashti, or rather, Queen Vashti. Please open your Bibles to Ester chapter 1.

Discuss what was going on, then read verses 10 - 12, and continue story. Discuss what it meant for women during the time as a result.

So we are discussing a time after the exile, in Persia where there are still many Israelites, and a King Xerxes I - son of Darius II. Darius II had a major reputation for abject cruelty, having anyone he chose killed for any reason at all, including messengers, friends, even family. Xerxes was also known for displaying this kind of cruelty.

Of Vashti we do not know a whole lot. In verse 9 it states that she also had a banquet while her husband celebrated with the men, indicating that the queen had liberty to make decisions and take action. The point of v. 9 is simply that Xerxes and Vashti were not acting in accord with each other. Their actions foreshadowed their separation soon to come.

We also know from verse 11 that she was “lovely to look at.” We all know that Esther was famous for her beauty and seduction, but here we see not only direct mention of Vashti’s beauty, but we see the fact that in order to display the greatness of his station, Xerxes wanted to show her off to his buddies. This suggests that she was one of, if not the most beautiful woman in the kingdom.

The Jewish Midrash states that Vashti was the daughter of King Belshazzar of Babylon - the King who was killed during the time of Daniel who saw the hand writing on the wall. This made her a descendent of Nebuchadnezzer - the king responsible for the destruction of the temple. This is a woman with history and standing of her own account.

So Xerxes gets drunk and calls for her to come and show off to his officers. She refuses to do so, and he is shamed in front of his closest subjects, causing him extreme anger. But why should she refuse?

It is believed by most, especially within Jewish tradition, that she was asked to appear in her royal crown - and nothing else. It was not unheard of during that time for a high ranking official - even a king - to show off his wife, even prostituting her to the most loyal of his subjects. Basically, he is asking the most beautiful woman around to appear nude in front of dozens of drunken revelers, surrendering her honor, likely her body, and possibly her life.

Undoubtedly, Vashti finds this idea distasteful. This is a woman who has been able to garner some influence and independence even when married to the king, so this is not only shameful for her, but it also reduces her influence and removes her personhood from the monarchy. She knows that this summoning takes the Queen of Persia and reduces her to a plaything for drunk men.

She says no. She has to know what her refusal will likely mean, and she has to know what will happen. These are far greater stakes than the possibility of losing a job. She will likely lose her position, probably her freedom, maybe even her life. 

Vashti is faced with basically the same outcome regardless of what she does. So she chooses dignity, and with it, she at least remains faithful to her own moral code, which shows immense bravery.

What begins as a seemingly personal denial to the king for her own modesty and safety is turned, by the kings attendants and advisors, into a matter of gender relations for the kingdom. If the queen will not obey the king, then why should any wife obey her husband?

Many of you know that Esther is a favorite book of feminist tradition in Christianity. In this, Vashti is considered a feminist icon for refusing the commands of her husband. In fact, American abolitionist author Harriet Beecher Stowe is quoted calling Vashti’s disobedience “the first stand for woman’s rights.” Another abolitionist and leader in women’s suffrage Elizabeth Cady Stanton stated the Vashti “added new glory to her day and generation...by her disobedience; for resistance to tyrants is obedience to God.”

In fact, many feminists find Vashti’s actions to further the feminist cause more effectively than those of Esther, even though Esther is considered the leading character and hero. Michele Landsberg, a Canadian Jewish feminist, writes: "Saving the Jewish people was important, but at the same time [Esther's] whole submissive, secretive way of being was the absolute archetype of 1950s womanhood. It repelled me. I thought, 'Hey, what's wrong with Vashti? She had dignity. She had self-respect. She said: 'I'm not going to dance for you and your pals.'"

The Jews have a very different take on her. The Midrash writing that speaks extensively of her background and ties to the Babylonian kings also portrays Vashti as being wicked and vain, largely due to the actions of her father and grandfather. Jewish tradition attributes her unwillingness to appear before before the king and his drinking partners not to modesty, but rather to an affliction with a disfiguring illness. One account relates that she suffered from leprosy, while another states that the angel Gabriel came and "fixed a tail on her." The latter possibility is often interpreted as "a euphemism for a miraculous transformation to male anatomy."

Regardless, Vashti has a far reaching legacy, even today. Besides Jewish and feminist traditions, the name Vashti meaning in the Hebrew “excellent woman, best of women” has become very common in pop culture. The name appears in countless novels, films, poems, even in video games.