What if, like a modern satirical Broadway musical or lampooned fairytale in cartoon form, the Book of Esther’s Haman turned out to be a misunderstood, bullied, OK kind of guy, and Mordechai a sadistic, conniving frat boy?
The fast of Queen Esther, the heroine of the Purim story, has become a day devoted to improving the status of agunot, women whose husbands refuse to grant them a Jewish divorce.