Of Purim and the fight against racism

This evening is the start of Purim. I always have, as I imagine most Jewish people who grew up within the Jewish community do, happy memories of Purim – which falls in the early days of Spring. When daffodils are very much making their mark on the world waking up (in the northern hemisphere, anyway) from a winter slumber.

Purim is a ‘happy’ festival. Probably the most fun that can be mustered in the name of faith – it’s hard to draw equivalents in other religions but think the Christmas fun and party part but without the heft of religious gravity. There are parties, usually with fancy dress for children. There is (of course) food to eat.

There are four specific obligations for Purim which are to give gifts of food (two different types) to friends and family – it should be at least two people and it should be via a third party, to give to charities (I remember it as giving to at least two different charities), eating a special large meal (there’s always food) and listening to the Book of Esther (which, while ostensibly being the least fun of the four obligations – isn’t actually that bad because a) it’s short and b) as a kid you get a chance to make a lot of noise by drowning out the name of Haman, the key antagonist, whenever it is read – and actively being encouraged to make noise in synagogue was pretty rare).

When I was at school, we had big parties with much laughter and joking. It wasn’t one of the core ‘family’ festivals but was more, in my memories at least, a time with friends and peers. There was always laughter and joy linked to Purim.

Last years’ Purim, which fell in early March, was held to be a possible reason for the high levels of covid within the Jewish communities. This year, Purim will be online.

I won’t recount the story of the Book of Esther which is the origin story of Purim. As expected it deals with an attempt to obliterate the Jewish people and a counter plot to save us instigated by Esther and her uncle, Mordechai.

Rather I’m interested, this year in the name – Purim. The name is stated in the reading of the Book of Esther and the Pur (‘im’ being the way masculine plurals are made in Hebrew so ‘pur’ is plural) is the lot that was cast when the king in Persia (as was) decided to annihilate all Jews. The date that was chosen – or when the Purim were drawn – becomes the date the commemoration of the ‘not being annihilated’.

It does make one ponder on the role that chance has on the life course – not just as individuals but as a community. The intended slaughter was down to the purim – the lots that were drawn. The intended murder was a physical act. Killing Jewish people. It wasn’t about converting or changing beliefs. It was about obliteration.

I think about the lots being drawn over the last year that has seen multiple losses. We are, in effect, hostages to fortune or luck. The Jewish people in Shushan (where the story of Esther is set) knew the date of their intended slaughter. The intervention of man/woman prevented this (of course in a religious sense there is the aspect of divine intervention but it is not overt like many of the other tales we tell).

We don’t know our ‘lot’, our Pur. We don’t know what challenge we might face and when, and where it is scheduled to arise. We don’t know whether we will be able to fight back. We don’t know if our host nations will allow us to or whether the people we live amongst will be fighting for us or against us. We don’t know if we will have another Mordechai or another Esther, rise. This is our history, etched in our blood and told through millennia. They will hate us because we are different. Because we have different customs, practices, histories and beliefs.

I am thinking of this in the context of antisemitism on the rise in this country. The last weeks have seen the targeting of Jewish students, simply because they are Jewish, by David Miller (although there are countless examples), an employee and teacher of sociology at Bristol University. I heard, last night, in an event to support Bristol JSoc, talk of students sitting in his lectures about power and hearing Jewish organisations disparaged and targeted.

There are always people who hate us because we exist, the modern day ‘Hamans’. The David Millers, the Chris Williamsons, the Ken Loaches. The unequivocal hatred. There are those who defend their right to hate. It does not make it less frightening. We have blood that is flowing through endless, relentless attempts to wipe us out and yet, our Esthers and our Mordechais emerge. Purim has more resonance with me this year as I see the need to speak out and speak up against racism warped and turned against us in this country.

The silence of those who claim to fight anti-racism, has been deafening with exceptions like the Bristol Student’s Union and the local Labour MP Thangam Debonnaire. But in the face of the struggle of hatred against a minority ethnic group, against racism within a university, I see the silence and indifference of too many and have some difficulty parsing this lack of interest with those who call themselves ‘anti-racist’.

But the story of Purim is about strong Jewish men and women who challenged hatred taken to the murderous extreme. There will always be those who hate what we are, what we were born to be – for no reason other than being different. We can’t force people who convince themselves that they can be good anti-racists while hating Jewish people, to come round.

In the end, the story of Purim, like so many tales we tell is the strength to fight coming from within the community and the need to prove our worth to convince others (in Esther’s case, the Persian king) that we should exist. The lots which were drawn where intended to mean the end of us. We survived. Let’s eat.