Arts&Life

purim

34 | MARCH 5 • 2020 

M

ost kids say 
Chanukah is their 
favorite holiday, but 
I have always been a Purim 
kinda girl. Maybe it’
s because 
my middle name is Esther. I do 
have vivid childhood memories 
of the celebrations my family 
did for the holiday. I think it’
s a 
just great opportunity to cele-
brate as a family. 
Purim — March 10 this year 
— is a holiday filled with food 
and joy that celebrates the story 
in the Megillat Esther (Book of 
Esther), where Jewish heroine 
Esther saves Persia’
s Jews from 

a deadly decree. It all starts after 
the first Temple in Jerusalem 
was destroyed and the Jews 
were exiled. Some went to 
Persia, now modern-day Iran. 
Persian King Ahashverosh 
had an affinity for parties that 
lasted days. During one of these 
wild parties, he wanted his 
queen to dance for the men, but 
she refused and was banished. 
This led to a beauty contest, 
with Esther being crowned 
queen. She was born as 
Hadassah, a Jew, who was raised 
by her uncle Mordechai. He 
told her to conceal her Jewish 

identity during the contest. 
Meanwhile, Mordechai 
refuses to bow down to 
Haman, the King’
s vizer, who 
is furious. Haman takes his 
hatred out on the Jewish peo-
ple and draws lots to pick a 
death date for them all. When 
Mordechai hears of Haman’
s 
plot, he asks Esther to inter-
cede on the Jews’
 behalf.
Esther agrees, but has the 
Jews fast for three days to 
give them luck. She dresses in 
her finest royal apparel and 
requests an audience with the 
King, who wants to know her 
desire. She says she simply 
wants the King and Haman 
to come to her banquet. She 
arranges a feast abundant 
with food and alcohol. At the 
conclusion, she requests that it 
continue the next night. 
After the following night, 
when the King was filled with 
wine, she reveals her true her-
itage and Haman’
s plot to kill 

her people. The King was furi-
ous. The plot was foiled, and 
Haman was led on horseback 
by Mordechai, the new vizer, 
to the gallows to be hung — 
instead of the Jews. 
The celebration of this 
heroine who saves the Jewish 
people is memorialized in the 
annual readings of the Megillat 
Esther, when adults and chil-
dren alike can dress in cos-
tume and drown out the name 
of Haman with loud noises 
during a reading. 
I always loved to create cos-
tumes as a kid and dress up for 
Sunday school growing up. I 
would carefully plan out what 
I was going to be for Purim, 
so I had the perfect costume. I 
would use my mom’
s jewel-
ry when I dressed as Queen 
Esther. As I got older, I helped 
my mom create a hamentashen 
(three-cornered cookie repre-
senting Haman’
s hat) costume. 
Now, with my kids, I enjoy 

Purim for 
Kids

Teach them the story and then —
create crowns for the holiday 
! 

BROOKE LEIBERMAN CONTRIBUTING WRITER

PHOTOS BY BROOKE LEIBERMAN

Cousins Jude Sternberg 
and Talia, Matan and 
Naomi Leiberman pose
in Purim hats they 
worked on themselves.