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Vashti



         


In the Bible, according to Esther 1:10-12, Vashti (meaning "beautiful") was the queen of king Ahasuerus, who was deposed from her royal dignity because she refused to obey the king when he desired her to appear naked in the banqueting hall of the palace of Shushan.

Supposedly, Vashti was the great-granddaughter of King Nebuchadnezzar.

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History vs. allegory

In the Bible, more specifically in the Book of Esther, Xerxes I of Persia is mentioned by the name of Ahasuerus (Hebrew אחשורוש ’ĂxašwērĂ´š, Achashverosh).

This story must be considered an allegory because the events it relates never occurred. The story begins in the third year of the reign of Xerxes, which would be 484 B.C. He did not have a wife named Vashti, (or "Esther," either) then or ever (his wife at this time was Amestris, daughter of a Persian general), but "Vashti" was the name of an Elamite goddess. "Esther," too, is the name of a goddess -- it's Aramaic for "Ishtar," the chief Babylonian goddess. ("Hadassah," the name Esther's family called her, comes from the Babylonian for "bride" and was one of Ishtar's titles.) "Shushan" is identified with Xerxes's capital, Susa. The story is part of an allegory saying that Babylonian gods replaced Elamite gods in Susa in the last years of the Assyrian Empire.

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