[resolved] Bug: Factbook Esther = wrong king?
I tried the new Factbook feature for Esther. It says her king/husband was Artaxerxes instead of Xerxes. If this is not a bug, I'd sure like to see the evidence for the different king.
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Jack Hairston said:
I tried the new Factbook feature for Esther. It says her king/husband was Artaxerxes instead of Xerxes. If this is not a bug, I'd sure like to see the evidence for the different king.
Where are you reading that in the factbook? Is it something Logos is proposing or is it in one of the resources the factbook links to? Can you post a screen shot
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Taken from the Baker Encyclopedia of the Bible:
The Book of Esther is set in the time of King Ahashuerus, who is Xerxes, referred to in Ezra 4:6 between Darius and Artaxerxes. The Hebrew Ahashuerus represents Khshayarsha, which the Greeks gave as Xerxes. On the other hand, the Septuagint has Artaxerxes and Josephus names Artaxerxes as the king of the Book of Esther. Esther provides a number of details of the life and customs of Persian royalty.
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Here's the relevant section from Wikipedia. You can see that both names are acceptable for Ahasuerus:
Ahasuerus is given as the name of the King of Persia in the Book of Esther.[4] 19th century Bible commentaries generally identified him with Xerxes I of Persia.[5] The Greek version (Septuagint) of the Book of Esther refers to him as Artaxerxes, and the historian Josephus relates that this was the name by which he was known to the Greeks.[6] Similarly, the Vulgate, the Midrash of Esther Rabba, I, 3 and the Josippon identify the King as Artaxerxes. The Ethiopic text calls him Arťeksis, usually the Ethiopic equivalent of Artaxerxes. John of Ephesus and Bar-Hebraeus identified him as Artaxerxes II, a view strongly supported by the 20th century scholar Jacob Hoschander.[7]Masudi recorded the Persian view of events which affirms the identification and al-Tabari similarly placed the events during the time of Artaxerxes II despite being confused by the Hebrew name for the king. Esther Rabba and the Vulgate present "Ahasuerus" as a different name for the king to "Artaxerxes" rather than an equivalent in different languages, and the Septuagint distinguished between the two names using a Greek transliteration of Ahasuerus for occurrences outside the Book of Esther. Indeed an inscription from the time of Ataxerxes II records that he was also known as Arshu understood to be a shortening of the Babylonian form Achshiyarshu derived from the Persian Khshayarsha (Xerxes). The Greek historians Ctesias and Deinon noted that Artaxerxes II was also called Arsicas or Oarses respectively similarly understood to be derived from Khshayarsha, the former as the shortened form together with the Persian suffix -ke applied to such shortened names
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Bump for FL
Dave
===Windows 11 & Android 13
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Dave Hooton said:
Bump for FL
I'm not sure where we get the data, but it sounds like Tom and Fred provided ample explanation to answer Jack's question.
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