start off on the right foot

There is a machlokes Tanaim as to exactly how much of the megillah needs to be read.  We pasken to read the entire thing, but there are multiple views that hold that first chapter of even the second chapter can be excluded.  Chasam Sofer asks why indeed is it that we include the early part of the story -– the party of Achashveirosh, what happened to Vashti, etc.  In terms of the miracle of Purim, all that really matters for us is that Haman hatched a plot to get us, thanks to Mordechai and Esther we were saved, and let’s eat.  The party, what happened to Vashti... who cares?

 

It’s no big deal, answers the Chasam Sofer, that after “sak v’eifer yutza la’rabim” and everyone does teshuvah, that Klal Yisrael is saved.  Why should we be worse than Ninveh, which was spared the destruction predicted by Yonah because the people did teshuvah? 

 

What should cause us to sit up and take notice is not the end of the story, but rather the beginning.  How is it that Achashveirosh was able to party for days and days on end and hold his liquor, and suddenly, at the end of the whole celebration he loses it and calls for Vashti to be brought in?  And how could he do something so foolish like actually kill Vashti just because she refused?  Why would his advisors have even suggested this as a punishment in the first place?  None of it makes sense! 

 

It only makes sense when placed in context of the story as a whole, as the first steps in a long chain of events guided by hashgacha to put Esther in place as queen, to bring out Achashveirosh's own weaknesses, to make him suspicious of enemies, all of which would eventually lead to Haman’s downfall.  The miracle of Purim does not begin to unfold only in the second half of the megillah –- the miracle already begins unfolding at the very start of the story.

 

What was Klal Yisrael doing at this time?  This was not a time of teshuvah, a time of “sak v’eifer.”  On the contrary, Klal Yisrael was partying, enjoying the feast of Achashveirosh, partaking of things that they should not have been partaking in.

 

That, says Chasam Sofer, is why we read that first section of the megillah. The lesson of Purim is not that when we do teshuvah and come close to Hashem that hashgacha works in our favor to save us, but rather that even when we are far away from where we should be holding, hashgacha is still working behind the scenes, arranging things for our benefit.  All that remains for us to do is trigger the salvation which is already waiting in the wings.