Esteem, estimation

• Esteem ' and ' esti- mate ' both come from Lat. oestimare, the latter directly, the former through Old Fr. estimer. The meaning of cBstimare is to assign a value, appraise, rate ; and that is the meaning of ' esti- mate' (Heb. ^1^) in Lv 27"'"', its only occur- rences in EV. 'Estimation ' occurs 20 times in the same chapter ; elsewhere Lv S" " 6', Nu 18", and • Schdrer (^HJP ii. iL 188 fl.) baa a full record of the litera- ture. The important names are Frankel, Die Essaer," in Zntschr. fur rfie retigiSsen InUrasen df Judenthutn^, 1846, 441-4(tl ; and ' Die Essaer nach thalraud. Quellen,' in MonaUchr, fur llach. u. Wisaemch. de» Judenlh. 1853, .'iO-iO, 61-73 ; Jost, (lexch. det JudeiMuma u. teiTKT Secten, 1857, i. 207-214 ; llerz- feld, Gi'iirJi. det Volk<-» Irr. (2nd ed. 1883), ii. 303 ff . , 388 £r. , 609 fl. ; Lijihttoot in Colnxnam and Philemon, 82-98, 349-419; same in Dumf^atv/ru, 323-4li7 ; Lucius, Der Kmeninimts, 1881 ; Uilpen- feld, Ki-'Ufnji'gcli. dfs Urchristejithuing, 1884, 87-149. Schurer may be supitlemented l)y adding ; Uinshurg in Smith and Wace, Diet. Chr. UiiKj. 1880 ; Ohle, 'Die Essener.^in JPTh (1888) xiv ; also ' Die PseiKlophilonischen Essaer und die Therapeuten.' in JSntnujt zur KtrchenjKch. 1888; Thomson, Bwkt which inlhii'nad our Lord. 18S9, 75-122; Morrison, Jew$ mider Kmnan Rule, 1890. 323-347; Cheyne, Oriyin of the Psalter, 1891, 418-421. 448-449; Cohn in JQR, 1892, 38-42; Fricdl^mder, 2ur BnUtehungSfjeich. det Chrigtenthumt, 1894, 9S-142 ; Cony- beare, Philo about the Contemplative Lift, 1695, 278 flf.— Editor. always in the same sense as ' estimate,' that is, valuation, price (Heb. ^"JB). Only once is 'estima- tion ' found in the mod. sense of ' hi"h value,' ' repute,' Wis 8'° ' For her sake I shall have estimation amon^ the multitude, and honour with the elders, though 1 be young' (54{a, RV 'glory'). Crannier ( Works, 1. 14) says, ' But to mine estimation, as much as I could view the ground, there was not slain upon both parties two thou- sand men.' This meaning of ' estimation ' is not found in AV, but it is the almost invariable sense in which ' esteem ' is used, that is, to esteem is to have an opinion (good or bad), reckon, as in He 10'-' Rhem. ' estemed the bloud of the testament polluted,' where AV and most VSS have 'counted' ; and as Knox, Hist. 312, ' he shall be esteemed and holden a seditious person.' Thus Ro 14° 'One man esteemeth one day above another : another esteemeth every day alike' (both Kpiva). Then the kind of juilgment is expressed by an adverb, ' highly,' ' lightly,' or the like. Sometimes ' esteem ' might appear to be used, like 'estimation,' in the mod. sense of 'think highly of.' But this impression is probably due to the context or the presence of some adverb. Thus Wis 12' ' that land which thou esteemest above all other ' (^ . . . Ti/uuTdrri yij, RV ' is most precious ') ; Sir 40^ ' Gold and silver make the foot stand sure ; but counsel is esteemed above them both ' {eiSoKt- netrai) ; Job 23" ' I have esteemed the wonls of his mouth more than my necessary food ' ("fijsy, RV ' I have treasured up '), 36" ' Will he esteem thy riches?' (T)i;^;q). Antf in particular. Is 53' ' He was despised, and we esteemed him not,' is generally taken in the sense of ' highly value ' ; but the Heb. verb (ss^^) is very rare in that sense, and is used in the next verse in its familiar sense of ' reckon ' — ' we did esteem him stricken.' Cf. Rid- ley, A Brefe Declaration, 1535 (Moule's ed. p. 101), ' eateth and drynketh his owne damnacion, by- cause he estemeth not the Lordes body ; that is, he reuerenceth not the Lordes bodi with the honour that is due unto him,' wliere the para- phrase contains more than the translation. J. Hastings. ESTHER (nnpN, "Eaeip, Pers. st&ra, ' star '), origin- ally named Hadassah (:!?■];! 'myrtle'). — A Jewess Avho has given her name to a l)ook of the OT, in which she holds a prominent place. Sprung from a family of the tribe of Benjamin, she spent her life in the Captivity in Persia, where she was brought up in humble circumstances as the orphan ward of her cousin Mordecai (Est 2'^). On the deposition of the Pers. queen Vashti for refusing to come at the command of her husband Ahasuerus (Xerxes, B.C. 485-465), ' to show the peoples and the princes her beauty,' on an occasion of high festivity at the court of Susa (l'""-), E. was selected to fill the vacant place of honour, as the fairest of many beautiful maidens brought before the kin" (2"'). Shortly after her elevation a great disaster threatened her countrymen. The grand vizier, ' Haman the Agagite,' enraged at the refusal of Mordecai to do obeisance to liim, accused the wliole nation of the Jews to the king as a disloyal and unprofitable people, and undertook to pay 10,000 talents of silver into the treasury as the proceeds of pillaging them. An edict was tliereupon issued for the extermination of all Jewish families tliroughout the empire, and for the confiscation of their property, on a certain day, which Haman had previously detennined by lot (ch. 3). In tliis crisis, moved by the tears of her fellow-country- men, and incited by Mordecai, who urged her to rise to the great opportunity set before her for the deliverance of her nation, E. (after a fast of three days on the part of the whole Jewish community) resolved to venture uninvited, at the risk of her ESTHER ESTHES, BOOK OF 773 life, into the presence of Ahasuerus, in order to intercede with him for her people (ch. 4). A gr&cious reception was accorded to ner by the king, who held out the golden sceptre, and agreed to dine with her in her apartments on two consecutive days (eh. 5). On the night preceding the second banquet (at which E. intended to make known her request) it happened by a singular coincidence that there was read to the king, to while away some sleepless hours, a portion of the national archives, which retarded a valuable serWce rendered by Mordecai in the detection of a plot against the king's life on the part of two of his chamberlains. For this service Mordecai had never been rewarded ; and when Uaman, elated with the high honour shown him by the queen (who had invited him to the banquet provided for the king), appeared at the palace next morning in order to ask permissiion to put Mordecai at once to an ignominious death, he was met with the question from the royal lips, ' What shall be done unto the man whom the king delighteth to honour ? ' Imagining, in his over- weening pride, that it must be himself that was meant, he suggested a triumphal procession, in which one of the chief noViIes should act the part of attendant. To his surprise and mortilication he found himself called upon to aerve in a menial capacity in the triumph of his Jewish adversary (ch. 6). This, as hi.s wife divined, was only the prelude to his downfall, which came to pass next day at the second banquet, wlien the king, learn- ing for the first time the nationality of the queen, and the distres.sing position in whieii the edict had placed her, ordered that Haman should be seized, and hanged forthwith on a lofty gallows which (as the king was at that moment informed by one of his courtiers) had been erected by Haman for the execution of Mordecai (ch. 7). The latter was at the same time raised to the vacant post of honour, and through his influence, and that of E., a second edict was issued and circulated, granting to the Jews the same powers, in the way of self-defence, as had been conferred in the previous edict on their enemies for the p\irpose of attack, — a direct re- vocation of the former edict being impossible according to the laws of the Medes and Persians. In consequence of these proceedings a dread of the Jews fell upon all peoples, many proselytes being gained — convinced, apparently, uy the logic of events (ch. 8) ; and when the fatal day arrived, the conflict issued in a great slaughter of their enemies and a decisive victory for the Jews, who, however, waived their right of plunder. To com- memorate their great deliverance, the joyful Feast of I'urim (which see) was instituted by E. and Mordecai as an annual observance for the whole nation. How far E. is to be regarded as a historical Sersonage, depends on the historicity of the look of Est (see below), her name not being men- tioned in any other tmok of the (>T, nor anywhere else in pre-Alex. literature. The only queen of Xerxes mentioned by Herodotus (vii. 61, 82, 114; ix. 108-112; cf. Ctesias, 20) is Amestris, a cruel and superstitious woman, whom some (Scaliger, PfeifTer, Eichhom, Bertholdt, Bunsen, Sliickard, etc.) would identify with Esther. But Amestris was a daughter of a Pers. general connected with the royal family, and the chronology and circum- stances of her reign cannot be reconciled with the biblical account either of E. or of Vashti. Xerxes (like his predecessors) may have had more wives than one, but, according to Pers. custom, they must have been taken from some of the great families connected with the throne, or from some other royal house ; and the most tenable hypo- thesis seems to be that E. (as well as Vashti) was merely the chief favourite of the seraglio, gaining a remarkable influence over the foolish and cap ricious monarch, and using that influence at a critical moment for the benefit of her Jewish com- patriots. While there are some things recorded of E. that offend our Christian feelin" — in particulai her \'indictive treatment of the bodies of Haraan'a sons (9"), and her request for an extension of time to the Jews at Susa for the slaughter of their enemies (9"), — regard must be had to the spirit of the age in which she lived, and to the passions that had been excited by Haman's inhuman malignity. On the other hand, her devotion to the cause of her oppressed nationality (' I will go in unto the king ; and if I perish, I perish '), and her dutiful bearin" towards her foster-father, notwithstanding the sudden rise in her fortunes, explain the honour in which her memory has been held by her country- men. J. A. M'Clymont.